Kyrgyzstan's Poison Parliament

Kyrgyzstan's decade-long experiment with parliamentary-style government ended in violence in October 2020, leading to the return of superpresidential rule. While many hoped that the parliamentary-style government introduced in 2010 would lead to a functioning electoral democracy, it only hollowed out formal institutions, weakened governance further, and widened the gulf between the state and the people. The presidency remained the focal point of the system, while the parliament and its many and the coalition governments served only as an increasingly weak check on the executive. Political parties failed to serve as channels between the citizens and policymaking. Instead, they functioned as conduits of particularistic business interests, reducing parliament to a marketplace for transacting corrupt deals. Overall, Kyrgyzstan's parliamentary decade serves as a reminder of the challenge of democratization in a context of a severe governance deficit.