The Autocrat’s Handbook

On May 15 last year, a little-known 71-year-old poet attempted to assassinate the Slovak Prime Minister, Robert Fico. Slovakia, a small nation located in the EU’s central east, was left shaken. How could it have come to this? The attack was preceded by half a year of severe social tensions after Fico assumed his fourth term of office on October 25, 2023. Since then, he — and his governing coalition of two populist parties and one rightwing party — have been pressing ahead with the gradual dismantling of democracy in the country. As a result, Slovakia now finds itself joining the ranks of countries where nationalist authoritarianism has found success in the 21st century: Poland under PiS, Trump’s USA of past and future, Hungary, Georgia, the UK during its Brexit frenzy, and Italy under Meloni’s “Fratelli D’Italia.”

International authoritarianism

What unites the authoritarian parties in these very different countries is the way they clearly position themselves against plurality while offering supposedly simple answers to the complexity of today’s world. They also pursue their objectives with similar means, often deploying the same narratives to this end. In her 2020 book Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism, Anne Applebaum offers a detailed analysis of these parties’ strategies: “Given the right conditions, any society can turn against democracy,” she observes. Authoritarianism is also on the march in Austria, France, and Germany. How the transition from democracy to authoritarianism actually functions can currently be witnessed “live” in the case of Slovakia.

Smer campaigns

While Fico’s party, Smer, might consider itself social democratic, it certainly is not — instead, it advocates national conservative positions and calls for the vilification of those with different views. During the election campaign, Smer published a short clip that went very literally below the belt. In that clip, a man who resembles the liberal politician Michal Šimečka stands draped in a rainbow flag, unable to decide which bathroom to enter, while a school bell rings in the background. Fico walks into the frame and tells the camera with a smile: “While the progressive Misho decides whether he is a boy, a girl or a helicopter today, for us gender ideology in schools is unacceptable and marriage is a unique union between a man and a woman.”

This is queer-phobia as we know it from Russia. Fico has also declared, on several occasions, that NGOs financed by international foundations will in the future be branded as “foreign agents” in order to end their alleged “rule” over Slovakia — a legislative project that follows the example of both Hungary and Russia. At present, such legislation is yet to be passed, but its implementation is likely just a matter of time. In other domains, meanwhile, Fico is rapidly pushing ahead with the dismantling of democracy.

Disinformation as Culture

Fico has assembled a cabinet that shares his ideology and shows him complete loyalty — competence, here, is of secondary importance. In this, he has been aided by the fact that Peter Pellegrini, founder of fellow populist party (and Smer coalition partner) Hlas, has held the office of President since mid-June 2024. Under Pellegrini, unlike his liberal predecessor Zuzana Čaputová, that office no longer acts as a supervisory authority.

One of the most active members of Fico’s cabinet has been the Culture Minister, Martina Šimkovičová, who was nominated for the office by the rightwing Slovak National Party (SNS) despite not herself being a member. Formerly a presenter for the country’s largest private television channel, “TV Markíza,” Šimkovičová is a familiar face in the Slovak disinformation landscape. Together with another SNS deputy, she founded and presented — even long after taking office — the online disinformation channel TV Slovan (“Slav TV”). This channel, which she has used in part as an official mouthpiece for the Ministry of Culture, looks like a cheaply produced version of the Tucker Carlson Show.

The channel’s content is very similar, too, with its main targets for hostility being migrants, progressives, and the queer community. Shortly after taking up her government post, the Minister made the catchy yet tautological pronouncement that the culture of the Slovak people “should be Slovak — Slovak and no other;” she has propagated Slavic folklore kitsch ever since. In January, she declared on social media that LGBTQ organizations would no longer be able to “parasitize the Ministry of Culture’s funds.” In the summer, she went so far as to claim that the “white race” was dying due to LGBTQ people.

Anne Applebaum has identified conspiracy theories and lies — which get spread and amplified algorithmically online in the absence of established media’s filtering effect — as a particularly vital instrument of authoritarian politicians. What feeds and often even awakens the patriotic yearning for a supposedly harmonious past national unity is a certain skillful playing on the keyboard of nostalgic feelings. Šimkovičová embodies these particular aspects in an almost caricature-like manner.

Fantasies of deportation

Fico’s strategy for the parliamentary elections in the fall of 2023 was accompanied by a hardening of his political stances to date — and by open racism. For instance, during the election campaign he said that, if it could not be done any other way, illegal immigration would be curbed “by force.” Paradoxically, as in Hungary, there are hardly any migrants in Slovakia; they only pass through on their way to Germany or other European countries. Turning migrants and minorities into scapegoats is a motif that we also see in Trump’s deportation fantasies as well as the increasing persecution of Central Asian migrants in Russia.

Pro-Russia and anti-progressive

It is scarcely surprising that Fico’s repertoire includes vehemently pro-Russian rhetoric as well. He has repeatedly claimed that the war was begun not by Russia but rather by “Ukrainian Nazis.” During the election campaign, he said that Ukraine would receive “not a single bullet” from Slovakia under his leadership. In his public utterances, the most significant enemies besides migrants and Ukraine are progressive NGOs, politicians, and media, who are — he claims — pulling the strings in Slovakia and hoping to destroy the country. Citing Karen Stenner’s research into authoritarian predisposition, Applebaum argues that many people are drawn to authoritarian thinking because they don’t want to engage with complexity. “They dislike divisiveness,” she writes. “They prefer unity. A sudden onslaught of diversity — diversity of opinions, diversity of experiences — therefore makes them angry. They seek solutions in new political language that makes them feel safer and more secure.”

Hate speech and division

Fico and his allies have an excellent command of this particular language, one that is typified by hate speech. Whoever does not belong to the regime-loyal camp has reason to be afraid. Yet the fact that the government’s rhetoric would culminate in an attack on Fico himself came as a tremendous surprise to both supporters and critics of the current regime. May 15 was a moment of shock for a divided nation.

This division, however, was something that Fico and his team had themselves helped to construct. It was part of Fico’s political calculus: a divide between “us” and “them,” between conservative townsfolk and progressive city-dwellers, between the economically better-off West and the poorer East, between those who advocate for a pluralistic democracy and those who want strong leadership — with both sides being played off against each other. The Corona pandemic and its attendant frustrations had already provided the perfect breeding ground for Fico’s comeback.

Paving the way for autocracy

Fico had already served as Prime Minister for two earlier spells from 2006 to 2010 and from 2012 to 2018, but he was forced to resign after mass protests following the death by contract killing of investigative journalist Ján Kuciak, in which Kuciak’s fiancée also died. The young journalist had been researching connections between Fico’s associates and the Italian mafia. Yet the fact that Fico remained a deputy of parliament, combined with loopholes in the Slovak judicial system, meant that he was able to secure immunity from prosecution — even though he had allegedly founded a criminal organization together with his then Interior Minister and current Defense Minister Robert Kaliňák, as Slovakia’s special prosecution office (NAKA) had found. The two men have been accused of exploiting their positions of political power, unlawfully persecuting political opponents, and enriching themselves through businesses.

As a result, Fico’s government took on the judiciary first. As early as the winter of 2023/24, it sought to implement fast-track changes to the criminal code. This reform of the judiciary — approved by parliament on February 8 — made provision for shortening penalties and statutes of limitations relating to serious crimes such as murder, rape, and corruption; it also sought to disband NAKA, which primarily investigates corruption cases, and to weaken whistleblower protections.

It was clear that, with these measures, Fico wanted to protect himself and his economic and political allies. Tens of thousands of Slovaks protested against Fico’s “reform plans,” and the EU Commission threatened a suspension of payments should the legislation be passed. This internal and external pressure has prevented the plans’ full implementation, but some elements — the abolition of NAKA, for instance — have nevertheless been enacted in recent months. The insecurity that followed the 2024 assassination attempt has also played a part in making this possible.

The survivor takes it all

Around one month after the attack on Fico, an assassination attempt was directed at then-US presidential candidate Donald Trump. These two would-be assassins had in common the fact that they each pursued no clear political agenda, holding rather syncretic worldviews. There were similarities, too, in the consequences of each attack. Both Fico and Trump were able, having survived, to portray themselves as martyrs for their political ideals (albeit of thwarted plots).

While still in recovery, Fico claimed that the assassin was an “activist of the Slovak opposition” and warned that the “anti-government media,” especially those with links to George Soros, should not dare claiming otherwise. The assassination offered Fico a welcome pretext for pushing through further measures directed against anyone protesting his political course.

In July of 2024, Lex Atentát (or “assassination law”) entered into force. This law has made it easier to restrict the freedom of assembly, ostensibly on grounds of national security. Authorities are now, for instance, able to ban gatherings if these “endanger public order.” What exactly this means has not been defined in detail. The period after the attack also provided an ideal moment for taking the axe to Slovakia’s public broadcasters, which had been commenting critically on Fico’s actions. The idea of transforming Slovak public media into a kind of state media — which originally came from the Culture Minister Šimkovičová — was carried out in practice on July 1. Protests against this development were modest on account of the earlier assassination attempt.

Autocrat bromances

In the wake of their respective attacks, Fico and Trump made a show of personal closeness between them. Fico wrote on Facebook about a phone call with Trump at the end of November: “We have been confronted with similar challenges, including attempts to imprison or physically liquidate us, which fortunately our opponents did not succeed in doing.”

In a second post on the same day, Fico shared a photo with Putin and wrote that he wanted to take part in the “celebrations of the victory over fascism” in Moscow on May 9, 2025. This was hardly surprising, since Fico had already mentioned making such a visit during a prior appearance on Russian state television in late October.

Fico did not wait until May, however, choosing instead to make an unannounced trip to visit Putin in the Kremlin on December 22, 2024. Their conversation focused on Russian gas supplies, which Slovakia was still receiving via Ukraine at the time — this transit arrangement for Russian gas was discontinued on January 1 of this year following the expiry of an old contract. At the same meeting, Fico made Putin the offer of holding peace negotiations on Slovak soil — an idea that pleased Putin but displeased many Slovak citizens, many of whom joined in vigorous protests.

Strike warfare

The more cultural institutions fall victim to Šimkovičová’s sledgehammer, the more visible resistance has become on the streets. The Culture Minister has closed down the Kunsthalle Bratislava art gallery and fired the popular directors of the National Theater, National Gallery, and National Library, among others, replacing these with personal associates lacking any experience in the culture sector. She has normalized cooperation with Russian and Belarusian institutions; she is also responsible for controversial new rules that, since August 1, have regulated the distribution of money from public culture funds. As a result, a large number of cultural projects across the country face the threat of future funding freezes.

On January 17, 2024, an appeal calling for the Minister’s resignation was shared online and received over 188,494 signatures, more than any other internet petition in Slovakia’s history. The petition failed, with the Ministry refusing to recognize the signatures. In the aftermath, however, the initiative “Otvorená Kultúra!” (Open Culture) — likely Slovakia’s largest, most vocal coalition for the protection of culture — was formed. Since then, the initiative has regularly called for protests against Fico’s government and its cultural policies. In September last year, it announced a “cultural strike,” a warning strike involving culture workers throughout the country.

Undoing the autocratic blueprint

The Slovak government’s course of action has been to systematically undermine the rule of law, weaken the judiciary, and “mark out enemies” within certain social groups. In this, we can recognize an autocratic blueprint being applied in Slovakia that is very similar to the strategy in other countries such as Hungary. That same blueprint is now also being discussed in the context of Donald Trump’s second inauguration – and there is every reason to do so in light of the detailed plans made under the title “Project 25” by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative US think tank, for the restructuring of the state under a second Trump administration.

As Applebaum has determined, the autocratic state coups begin in the domains of the judiciary, state institutions, and culture. It is in precisely these domains that Fico and his allies have been enacting a radical transformation in Slovakia for a little over a year. We can assume that they will be continuing on their course. Yet their course of action has been met with loud opposition from Slovak civil society. This offers a reminder that authoritarianism is not set in stone. And the example of Poland shows that it is indeed possible to make one’s way back — albeit with a great deal of effort.