states—United States and Europe—has attributed the cause of populist backlash to national government disregarding the interests of average citizens for business elites. In sum, Berman is trying to demonstrate that populism has led to the rise of illiberal democracies, while the populism has gained traction as a result in democratic institutions being too elite-led. Criticism Writers such as Steven Levitsky and Lucan Way reject the concept of an illiberal democracy, saying it only "muddies the waters" on the basis that if a country does not have opposition parties and an independent media, it is not democratic. They say that terms like "illiberal democracy" are inappropriate for some of these states because the term implies that these regimes are at their heart democracies that have gone wrong. Levitsky and Way say that states such as the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia under Slobodan Milošević, Zimbabwe and post-Soviet Russia were never truly democratic and not developing toward democracy, but were rather tending toward authoritarian behavior despite having elections, which were sometimes sharply contested. Thus, Levitsky and Way coined a new term to remove the positive connotation of democracy from these states and distinguish them from flawed or developing democracies: competitive authoritarianism. According to Wojciech Sadurski, "illiberal democracy is largely an oxymoron" in Poland, because "[b]y dismantling various checks and balances, and the many democratic institutions related to elections and judicial review, the ruling party greatly weakens the democratic character of the state". Sadurski prefers the term "plebiscitarian authoritarianism". In 1998, author Marc Plattner said that democracy and liberalism have a turbulent relationship, where throughout history they constantly repel and attract one another. Plattner believes that the rise of illiberal democracies is merely part of a democratization cycle, where states democratizing will often shift from liberal to illiberal tendencies. From this, Plattner believes that through the careful assistance of consolidated democracies these 'illiberal democracies' can slowly push themselves out of this cycle. According to a study by George Washington University political scientist Michael K. Miller, multiparty autocratic elections predict significantly better outcomes on health, education, gender equality, and basic freedoms relative to non-electoral autocracy. Effects on health and education are as strong as those of democracy and are significantly better than in non-electoral autocracy. See also Authoritarian democracy Authoritarian capitalism Authoritarianism Criticism of democracy Democratic backsliding Defective democracy Dictablanda Dominant-party system Guided democracy Herrenvolk democracy Hybrid regime Inverted totalitarianism Liberal autocracy Political corruption Representative