Unintentional Democratic Backsliders. “Evil Always Wins Through the Strength of its Splendid Dupes”

This, mainly conceptual, paper concerns the democratic backsliding process, focusing on spe-cific and understudied actors whose actions (or non-actions) unintentionally contribute to theundertakings of autocrats or “would-be autocrats,” instead of concentrating on often analysedincumbents. The authors propose in this regard a concept of “unintentional backsliders,” includ-ing its definition, typology, and model of mapping actors who, due to recklessness or negligence,unintentionally support democratic backsliding. The spectrum of such backsliders has been ad-ditionally outlined in the case of Poland, the fastest de-democratising country recently - in orderto demonstrate that the proposed conceptual framework can be translated into a political realityand has a potential to be applied in empirical studies.