In 2021, amid escalating tensions and a burgeoning migration crisis along its eastern frontier, the Polish government declared a state of emergency bordering Belarus. This extraordinary political decision entailed unprecedented restrictions on civil liberties for residents in the afflicted border areas. Freedoms fundamental to democratic societies—such as assembly, mobility, and access to media—were severely curtailed through the imposition of a strict emergency zone enforced with heightened security measures. Expectedly, such measures sparked vigorous public debate and legal challenges, raising a pivotal question: did these autocratic-leaning restrictions translate into an electoral backlash against the incumbent political authorities?
In a groundbreaking forthcoming study published in The Journal of Politics, political scientists Anil Menon of the University of California, Merced, and Paweł Charasz of The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, provide an incisive data-driven exploration of this issue. Their research probes whether the suspension of democratic rights amid a crisis provoked voters to penalize Poland’s ruling Law and Justice party (Prawo i Sprawiedliwość, PiS) at the ballot box. With access to comprehensive electoral data from both the 2019 pre-crisis election and the 2023 post-crisis election, the authors harness a sophisticated statistical framework—difference-in-discontinuities—to rigorously isolate the specific causal effect of the state of emergency on electoral outcomes.
Contrary to prevailing expectations and normative democratic theory, their analysis reveals that the punitive effect on PiS’s vote share in affected localities is remarkably muted. The quantitative findings indicate only a marginal decrease in support—between 0.8 and 1.7 percentage points—and crucially, this decline is not statistically significant given their rigorous confidence intervals. Furthermore, voter turnout levels remained largely stable, and there was no discernible surge in votes for opposition parties. In other words, the restriction of rights and freedoms within the emergency zone did not translate into a meaningful electoral penalty for the government imposing them.
This counterintuitive result challenges assumptions about democratic accountability during states of crisis. The authors hypothesize that voters may exhibit a trade-off calculus, wherein perceived government effectiveness on salient issues—chiefly, controlling the border and illegal migration—outweighs concerns about democratic restrictions. Evidence from survey data and broader contextual analysis suggests that citizens valued decisive state action aimed at stemming the influx of migrants funneled deliberately by Belarus, despite the accompanying curtailment of civil liberties. This tolerance may underscore a pragmatic, if uneasy, acceptance among electorates faced with security challenges and perceived existential threats.
The Polish case illuminates broader dynamics that have permeated democratic countries globally, where governments increasingly wield emergency powers in response to crises from immigration to public health. Menon and Charasz argue that their findings offer a critical perspective on the rise of “strongman” governance models: democratic leaders may strategically deploy emergency measures with limited fear of electoral reprisals, effectively recalibrating the balance between security and rights. Such trends raise probing questions about the resilience and adaptability of democratic institutions under pressure.
To carry out their analysis, Menon and Charasz collected detailed electoral returns from municipalities within and adjacent to the emergency zone. This comparative spatial design, combined with temporal data from two consecutive parliamentary cycles, allowed them to apply the difference-in-discontinuities method. This approach leverages the geographic boundary of the emergency zone as a natural experiment, comparing voting patterns on both sides before and after policy implementation. The method’s rigorous controls for confounders strengthen confidence that observed effects—or their absence—are the direct consequence of the emergency’s restrictions rather than extraneous variables.
The state of emergency itself was precipitated by a deliberate strategy from Belarus, which channeled migrants toward Poland’s eastern border as part of geopolitical pressure. In response, the Polish government declared a three-month emergency period characterized by strict controls over movement, curfews, media blackout zones, and increased military deployment. Many of these measures extended beyond the initial timeline, persisting for an additional seven months. While these policies provoked outcry from human rights advocates and mobilized civil society actors, the electoral response among local constituencies remained remarkably subdued.
Menon and Charasz emphasize that their findings should not be interpreted as voter endorsement of the emergency measures or the erosion of civil liberties. Instead, the results highlight a complex electoral calculus whereby democratic costs do not directly translate into electoral punishment for incumbents when contextual factors—such as perceived government efficacy on crisis issues—come into play. This nuanced understanding challenges simplistic narratives that voters uniformly reward or punish incumbents based solely on rights violations, signaling the importance of political context and issue salience.
Looking beyond Poland, this research invites further scholarly interrogation into how democratic electorates weigh policy outcomes against institutional costs. Understanding the conditions under which voters tolerate restrictions can illuminate pathways through which democratic erosion may proceed incrementally under the guise of crisis management. Menon and Charasz advocate for future investigations integrating qualitative data, voter surveys, and international comparisons to better map the contours of democratic resilience and vulnerability in an era marked by frequent emergencies.
In sum, the study of Poland’s 2021 state of emergency unveils the paradox of borderline democracy, where draconian restrictions coexist with near-continuity in democratic electoral support. It offers a sobering template for how democracy confronts external pressures and internal anxieties—through the strategic balancing act of security and rights, resilience and concession. For scholars, policymakers, and citizens alike, such findings underscore the imperative to critically examine the democratic cost of crisis governance, recognizing that electoral calculus may mask deeper institutional shifts underway.
As debates rage about the future of democracy in Europe and beyond, the Polish experience provides a cautionary example of how emergency powers, even when constrained geographically and temporally, can recalibrate political accountability mechanisms. It underscores the potential for democratic governments to leverage crises to consolidate power with limited immediate electoral consequence, thereby reshaping governance norms and political landscapes. In this light, vigilance, robust democratic safeguards, and informed public discourse remain crucial bulwarks against the incremental erosion of democratic freedoms.
Subject of Research: People
Article Title: Borderline Democracy? The Electoral Consequences of the 2021 State of Emergency on the Poland-Belarus Border
News Publication Date: 11-Jul-2025
Web References: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/737687
References: Menon, Anil and Charasz, Paweł. “Borderline Democracy? The Electoral Consequences of the 2021 State of Emergency on the Poland-Belarus Border.” The Journal of Politics, forthcoming 2025.
Keywords: State of Emergency, Electoral Behavior, Poland, Belarus Border, Law and Justice Party, Democratic Liberties, Migration Crisis, Difference-in-Discontinuities, Political Accountability, Crisis Governance, Civil Liberties Suspension, Strongman Politics
