Research framework and broader academic knowledge base
Serbia: documented application of the same framework
Why do 'temporary' emergency measures often remain after the crisis?
“Temporary” measure often remains because after the crisis there are already a service, a budget, a database, equipment and people whose position depends on its continuation. The government gets used to faster decision-making without control, the service to the wider powers, and the public can long accept the rationale that the danger has not completely passed.
Measures do not have to be extended by the same name: they can be moved to a regular law or a new institution. Therefore, the expiration date is not enough if the government can routinely move it. The exception becomes a more difficult rule when the continuation requires a new public explanation and vote, when the court can check the necessity, when the data on the application is published and when the collected data and temporary services are indeed extinguished after the end of the crisis.
The deadline can be constantly extended or bypassed by the new law. Protection is only valid if someone has the data and enough power to implement it.
Works supporting this answer, with their evidence type and an explanation of how they relate to the claim.
comparing several countries or cases
Gross, O. i Ní Aoláin, F. (2006), Law in Times of Crisis: Emergency Powers in Theory and Practice, Cambridge University Press.
- Contribution to this answer
- Gross and N Aoláin show how difficult it is to make an emergency regime that is strong enough during the danger and then really disappears. Once institutionalized, the exception can change the law and practice of the executive power even after the crisis.
review more research
Scheuerman, W. E. (2006), „Emergency Powers“, Annual Review of Law and Social Science 2: 257–277.
- Contribution to this answer
- Scheuerman is the most direct here: the executive power has the incentive to extend and use extraordinary powers even after the initial danger, so protective procedures must be made against these incentives.
review more research
Ginsburg, T. i Huq, A. Z. (2018), How to Save a Constitutional Democracy, University of Chicago Press.
- Contribution to this answer
- Ginsburg and Huq show how temporary or special measures can become part of a broader democratic erosion if they weaken the limits of executive power, rights or shiftability.
comparing several countries or cases
Scheppele, K. L. (2018), „Autocratic Legalism“, University of Chicago Law Review 85(2): 545–583.
- Contribution to this answer
- Scheppele shows how the exception can be normalized through regular laws, procedures and institutions. What is introduced as a temporary can thus become part of the ordinary way of management.
comparison of different combinations of conditions
Panzano, G. i Tomini, L. (2026), „Unity Makes Strength: Patterns of Democratic Resistance against Autocratization“, European Journal of Political Research, First View: 1–26.
- Contribution to this answer
- Panzano and Tomini do not study the duration of emergency measures, but give an important counter-mechanism: combined institutional, political, and social resistance can stop autocratization and prevent the temporary extension of power from becoming permanent.
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