There's actually a lot to be said about the concept of "competitive" (not necessarily democratic) elections and how they increase the stability of a political system by shifting people's perceptions of what is wrong, that's part of what Fritz Bartel talks about in "The Triumph of Broken Promises", the neoliberal period imposed extremely harsh conditions on people but everybody went along in the end because they felt that they had a choice in the matter (lol) meanwhile the eastern block states wanted to try doing austerity but they knew the people would never stand for it.