Liberal democracy is facing renewed challenges from a growing group of states undergoing democratic backsliding. While entrenched autocrats have long resented and contested the established liberal order, we know far less about how newer backsliding states behave on the international stage. We argue these states, who joined prominent western liberal institutions prior to their backsliding, will use their established membership in these organizations both to protect themselves from future scrutiny regarding adherence to liberal democratic values and to oppose the prevailing western liberal norms that increasingly conflict with their evolving interests. Using voting data from the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) from 2006-2021, we show that backsliding states are more likely to vote against targeted resolutions that name and shame specific countries. We supplement this analysis with detailed data from the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) and combine regression analysis and a structural topic model (STM) to show that backsliding states are more critical in their UPR reports when evaluating advanced western democracies, and more likely to emphasize issues that align with their own interests while de-emphasizing ones that might threaten government power and control over citizens.

自由民主正面临着越来越多经历民主倒退的国家带来的新挑战。尽管根深蒂固的独裁者长期以来一直对既定的自由秩序感到不满和质疑，但我们对新的倒退国家在国际舞台上的表现知之甚少。我们认为，这些在倒退之前加入了著名的西方自由主义机构的国家将利用其在这些组织中的既定成员身份，既保护自己免受未来关于坚持自由民主价值观的审查，又反对与它们日益冲突的盛行的西方自由主义规范。不断发展的兴趣。利用联合国人权理事会 (UNHRC) 2006 年至 2021 年的投票数据，我们发现，倒退的国家更有可能投票反对点名和羞辱特定国家的有针对性的决议。我们用来自普遍定期审议（UPR）的详细数据来补充这一分析，并结合回归分析和结构主题模型（STM）来表明，在评估先进的西方民主国家时，倒退的国家在其普遍定期审议报告中更为关键，并且更有可能强调那些符合他们自身利益的问题，同时淡化那些可能威胁政府权力和对公民控制的问题。