Replication Data for: Backsliding by Surprise: The Rise of Chavismo

How do elected autocrats come to power? Prominent explanations point to distributive conflict. We propose instead that some candidates advertise democratic
deconsolidation as “deepening democracy,” which can have crosscutting appeal.
We evaluate this proposal through the election of Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez, an
emblematic elected autocrat. Using original data, we find that historical voting
patterns and political rhetoric are consistent with our proposal: Chávez came to
power with the cross-class support of voters from across the traditional political
spectrum, and his campaign emphasized rather than obscured his plan to remake
political institutions.

民选独裁者（elected autocrats）如何掌权？主流解释指向分配冲突。我们则提出另一种观点：部分候选人将民主去巩固化（democratic deconsolidation）宣传为“深化民主”，这可能具有跨领域吸引力。我们通过委内瑞拉的乌戈·查韦斯——一位典型的民选独裁者——的当选来验证这一观点。基于原始数据，我们发现历史投票模式与政治修辞均与我们的观点一致：查韦斯凭借来自传统政治光谱各领域选民的跨阶级支持掌权，且其竞选活动强调而非掩盖了他重塑政治制度的计划。