ABSTRACT Democracy is backsliding throughout Southeast Europe but there are no signs of full democratic breakdown. Instead, political parties and their leaders incrementally undermine challenges to governmental authority while keeping electoral contest largely intact. This article introduces a special issue that aims to examine and explain democratic decline by looking at the prevalence of illiberal politics across countries and issues. In order to overcome the limitations of fixed regime classification we adopt a procedural lens and look into governing practices that gradually tilt the electoral playing field. Utilizing the concept of Illiberal politics allows us to examine sets of policies enacted by political parties in government with the aim to remain in power indefinitely. By tracing democratic decline in Serbia, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Albania, and Croatia we observe different patterns of weakness, but also common causes arising from weak institutions and inherited governance practices that preserve executive dominance, patronage, and informality.

中文翻译：

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东南非自由政治的兴起

摘要民主在整个东南欧都在下滑，但是没有完全民主崩溃的迹象。取而代之的是，各政党及其领导人逐步削弱了对政府权威的挑战，同时又保持了选举竞争的完整。本文介绍了一个特刊，旨在通过研究各国和各个问题之间的非法政治的流行来研究和解释民主衰落。为了克服固定制度分类的局限性，我们采用了程序性的方法，并研究了逐渐使选举竞争环境倾斜的治理实践。利用非政治政治的概念，我们可以检查政党在政府中制定的一系列政策，以期无限期地保持政权。通过追踪塞尔维亚，北马其顿，黑山的民主衰落，