Empirical evidence demonstrates that interventions enhancing transparency and accountability reduce both voter rationalization and legislative arrogance, supporting the model's emphasis on increasing perceived justice (JJJ) as a stabilizing lever.
Conversely, regions with minimal enforcement against vote buying or weak civic engagement correspond to high U/JU/JU/J ratios in simulations, resulting in systemic authoritarian drift, mirroring real-world patterns of entrenched political dominance.
The TDD framework not only captures observed voter and legislative behaviors in Indonesia but also explains emergent system-level outcomes, such as democratic degradation, authoritarian drift, and social unrest. Its predictive capacity provides a formal basis for policy interventions, reinforcing the importance of controlling incentives, enhancing justice perception, and monitoring critical bifurcation thresholds to maintain democratic stability.
C. Policy Implications: Mitigating Vote Buying, Enhancing Accountability, Restoring Democratic Legitimacy
The Transactional Degradation of Democracy (TDD) framework offers actionable insights for policymakers, civil society, and electoral institutions aiming to counter transactional politics, enhance accountability, and preserve democratic legitimacy. Simulation results and empirical alignment underscore three interrelated policy domains:
1. Reducing Monetary Incentives (U)
Rationale: High monetary inducements increase voter rationalization (Ar) and enable legislative arrogance (Ap), accelerating democratic degradation (D).
Policy Measures:
Strict enforcement against vote buying: Implement real-time monitoring of campaign transactions and electoral violations.
Electoral financing transparency: Require detailed disclosure of candidate expenditures to minimize opportunities for transactional politics.
Civic education campaigns: Raise awareness about the long-term costs of accepting material incentives, highlighting the connection to systemic degradation.
Expected Outcome: Reducing decreases micro-level rationalization, interrupts feedback loops, and lowers the probability of authoritarian drift.
2. Enhancing Perceived Justice (J)
