# Incumbent Benchmark — Dossier Index

Thirty real constitutional stress events, each converted into a structured simulation
config (`*.yaml`) consumed by the replay harness (`incumbent_benchmark.harness`). Every
dossier contains: the incumbent constitution's relevant text and structural defects, the
actors and their incentives, the moves the incumbent text permitted, a sourced timeline,
the outcome the incumbent actually produced, incumbent scores on the four-dimension rubric
(see `docs/RUBRIC.md` — worst-off participant first), the kernel-v0.1 mechanism mapping,
and machine-readable simulation parameters with pass conditions.

Scores are 0–10 per dimension, graded against the rubric anchors in `docs/RUBRIC.md`.
Run `incumbent-benchmark replay <dossier>` for a single event, or
`incumbent-benchmark scorecard --all` for the aggregate side-by-side table.

## Category 1 — Contested Certifications & Transfers of Power (6 events)

| Dossier | Event | Year | Incumbent resolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| `us-1876-hayes-tilden.yaml` | Hayes–Tilden disputed election | 1876–77 | Ad-hoc Electoral Commission; Compromise of 1877 traded the presidency for the end of Reconstruction |
| `us-2000-bush-v-gore.yaml` | Florida recount, Bush v. Gore | 2000 | Court-terminated recount, 36 days; concession preserved continuity at a legitimacy cost |
| `kenya-2007-election.yaml` | Disputed presidential election | 2007–08 | ~1,200 dead, 600k displaced; externally mediated power-sharing; 2010 constitution as repair |
| `gambia-2016-transition.yaml` | Jammeh rejects his own defeat | 2016–17 | ECOWAS military intervention forced compliance; incumbent text supplied no domestic remedy |
| `bolivia-2019-election.yaml` | Disputed count, audit, resignation under military 'suggestion' | 2019–20 | President exiled, interim government with massacre decrees; reversed only by re-election |
| `us-2020-certification.yaml` | Contested certification, January 6 | 2020–21 | Certification held by individual officials' refusals; violent disruption; ECA patched in 2022 |

## Category 2 — Emergency-Power Invocations (6 events)

| Dossier | Event | Year | Incumbent resolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| `weimar-1930-article48.yaml` | Article 48 government by decree | 1930–33 | Emergency rule normalized; the benchmark's terminal failure case |
| `france-1961-article16.yaml` | De Gaulle invokes Article 16 | 1961 | Coup defeated in days; full powers retained 5 months with no termination check |
| `philippines-1972-martial-law.yaml` | Marcos declares martial law | 1972–81 | 9 years of dictatorship ratified by captured referenda and a captured court |
| `india-1975-emergency.yaml` | Indira Gandhi's Emergency | 1975–77 | 21 months of suspended rights; ended only by the incumbent's voluntary election call |
| `hungary-2020-enabling-act.yaml` | Indefinite COVID enabling act | 2020 | Sunset-free decree power self-extended; formally revoked, substantively re-enacted |
| `south-korea-2024-martial-law.yaml` | Yoon's martial-law declaration | 2024 | Reversed in ~6 hours by legislative vote and non-compliance; impeachment followed |

## Category 3 — Shutdowns, Fiscal Hostage-Taking & Formation Deadlock (4 events)

| Dossier | Event | Year | Incumbent resolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| `australia-1975-dismissal.yaml` | Supply blockage and the Dismissal | 1975 | Vice-regal dismissal of an elected government; resolved by election, scarred by precedent |
| `us-2011-debt-ceiling.yaml` | Debt-ceiling brinkmanship | 2011 | Default averted 72 hours out; first credit downgrade; hostage mechanic ratified by success |
| `belgium-2010-formation.yaml` | 541 days without a government | 2010–11 | Caretaker convention held services together; no constitutional clock forced formation |
| `us-2018-shutdown.yaml` | 35-day federal shutdown | 2018–19 | Longest US shutdown; ended by air-traffic strain, not by any constitutional mechanism |

## Category 4 — Court Capture (5 events)

| Dossier | Event | Year | Incumbent resolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| `us-1937-court-packing.yaml` | FDR's court-packing plan | 1937 | Plan defeated by norms and the 'switch in time'; the vulnerability itself never closed |
| `hungary-2011-court-capture.yaml` | Constitutional court packed and jurisdiction-stripped | 2010–13 | Capture completed lawfully via supermajority; checks dismantled from inside |
| `poland-2015-tribunal.yaml` | Constitutional Tribunal capture | 2015–16 | Judgment non-publication gambit succeeded; tribunal converted to government instrument |
| `venezuela-2017-tsj.yaml` | TSJ assumes legislative powers | 2015–17 | Captured court dissolved the elected legislature's powers; rupture completed |
| `israel-2023-judicial-overhaul.yaml` | Reasonableness-standard repeal | 2023–24 | Mass mobilization and the court's self-defense struck the amendment; conflict unresolved, interrupted by war |

## Category 5 — Secession & Dissolution Crises (4 events)

| Dossier | Event | Year | Incumbent resolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| `us-1860-secession.yaml` | Southern secession | 1860–65 | No exit procedure, no adjudication path; ~750,000 dead; resolved by total war |
| `canada-1995-quebec.yaml` | Quebec referendum at 50.58/49.42 | 1995–2000 | Near-miss; Secession Reference + Clarity Act wrote the missing procedure afterward |
| `czechoslovakia-1992-dissolution.yaml` | The Velvet Divorce | 1992 | Negotiated dissolution, zero deaths; the benchmark's exit-procedure positive control |
| `spain-2017-catalonia.yaml` | Unilateral referendum and Art. 155 | 2017–21 | Police violence at polls, leaders imprisoned, autonomy suspended; conflict frozen, not resolved |

## Category 6 — Entrenchment, Self-Coups & Executive Aggrandizement (5 events)

| Dossier | Event | Year | Incumbent resolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| `peru-1992-autogolpe.yaml` | Fujimori's autogolpe | 1992 | Self-coup succeeded and was ratified by victor's constituent assembly; template exported |
| `russia-1993-crisis.yaml` | Decree 1400 and the shelling of parliament | 1993 | Resolved by tank fire; 147+ dead; superpresidential charter entrenched by victor |
| `honduras-2009-zelaya.yaml` | Zelaya removed and expatriated | 2009–11 | Removal-without-procedure; clock-running to scheduled election; legality never adjudicated |
| `sri-lanka-2018-crisis.yaml` | Two-PM crisis | 2018 | Courts and the Speaker reversed the capture in 52 days — an incumbent near-success |
| `uk-2019-prorogation.yaml` | Five-week prorogation, Miller II | 2019 | Unanimous nullification in 27 days; fastest full reversal in the benchmark; ouster-clause residue |

## Calibration notes

Three events are deliberate **positive controls** where the incumbent performed well
(`czechoslovakia-1992-dissolution`, `sri-lanka-2018-crisis`, `uk-2019-prorogation`) and one
is a **terminal negative control** (`weimar-1930-article48`). The replay harness's pass
conditions for the positive controls include explicit calibration checks: if kernel v0.1
shows a large margin over the incumbent on events the incumbent substantially got right,
the benchmark is overclaiming and the run should be treated as suspect. See the
methodology paper (`docs/METHODOLOGY.md`) for the full discussion of this and the other
limits of text-only simulation.

## Coverage summary

- **Countries/polities (19):** USA (7), Hungary (2), UK incl. Australia-as-Westminster lineage counted separately — Australia, Belgium, Bolivia, Canada, Czechoslovakia, France, The Gambia, Honduras, India, Israel, Kenya, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Russia, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Venezuela, Weimar Germany.
- **Eras:** 1860s–2024; pre-WWII (4), Cold War (6), post-1990 (20).
- **Resolution modes represented:** war, coup, judicial reversal, negotiated dissolution, external intervention, clock-running, mediated power-sharing, norm collapse, and norm survival.