It looks like you're referencing the concept of "autocratic legalism" as developed by political and legal scholar Kim Lane Scheppele.
5. Why It Works (The "Legal" Trap)
Scheppele emphasizes that autocratic legalism creates a trap for domestic and international actors:
- Coalition-building across parties and civil society to defend institutions.
- Domestic and transnational naming-and-shaming combined with conditional aid or sanctions tied to rule-of-law benchmarks.
- Civic education and resilience-building to maintain popular support for constitutional norms.
- Domestic Opposition: Because the autocrat is following the law, there is no clear "spark" for a revolution. People do not riot against a tax audit or a zoning regulation, even if the intent is political.
- International Community: International organizations (like the EU) are built to punish illegal actions, not unpopular laws. When an autocrat passes a law through a parliamentary majority, the EU often has no legal mechanism to intervene.
The ultimate implication of Scheppele’s work is that the defense of democracy cannot rely solely on legal technicalities. If the law can be weaponized to destroy liberty, then the solution must be political and cultural, not just juridical. Protecting democracy requires an alert citizenry, a fiercely independent media, and a political opposition capable of framing legal maneuvers as political assaults on freedom. As Scheppele’s analysis of the "Frankenstate" demonstrates, once the pieces of the democratic constitution are stitched together into an autocratic monster, it is often too late to dismantle it through the very legal system that created it. The rule of law, she reminds us, is a fragile convention, maintained not by courts, but by the collective will to restrain power.