POLS 0200 Chapter 9 - Dictatorship

Challenges of studying autocracies?

1. Preference falsification (asking people for opinions on regime are not always true)

2. Internal politics hidden from public view

3. Informal agreements often trump formal rules

4. Data scarcity

5. State-owned media -→ or media censored

Ways of defining dictatorship x2

1. Residual definition: A regime that is NOT a democracy

2. Substantive definition: Politically exclusive rule

   • Multiple leaders might come and go within regime (e.g. rotation of leaders within CCP in China —> leader changes, but regime stays the same)

   • Autocracies rely on a form of legitimation (independence struggle in Zimbabwe, Holy Quran for Taliban)

   • Regime can have an ideological basis, or none at all (Communism in Soviet Union, Juche in North Korea)

Typology of dictatorships (name of the authors?)

Cheibub, Gandhi and Vreeland

Brief explanation of 3 types of dictatorships

1. Monarchic: Executive holds power on basis of family and kin networks (UAE, Saudi Arabia)

2. Military: Relies on armed forces to come into and stay in power (Myanmar)

   1. Civilian: Dominant party regime (Communist party in Soviet Union) OR personalistic (North Korea Kim Jong Un, Putin)

Monarchic dictatorship

Overall definition: A regime where the executive holds power on the basis of family and kin networks

• Particularly stable form of dictatorship

• Suffers from less violence and political instability

• Usually leads to economic growth and stable property rights

• Political culture that maintains loyalty of support coalition

  • Clear rules delineating outsiders and insiders

  • Clear rules for revenue and rent sharing

  • Institutions that allow royal family to monitor actions of monarch —> royal council and advisory bodies

Saudi Arabia - classified as a moderately stable state in the fragile states report 2016

• When monarchic dictatorships collapse, often followed by even more oppressive regimes

• Also, royal family can colonize gov posts, maintaining loyalty and preventing opposition from emerging

Military dictatorship

Overall definition: Regime where the executive is a current or former member of the military, and relies on armed forces to stay in power

• Typically rule as part of a junta or committee —> can have a leader but ruled by military as an institution

• Often portrayed as guardians of national interest —> but motivated by own self interests

• Biggest threat to stability comes from military itself —> armed forces can form factions and try to uprise and overthrow current leadership

• Generally short-lived —> more likely to end with negotiations than violence (some evidence that this regime is more likely to lead to formation of democracy)

  e.g. History of military rule in Guinea (Africa) —> constantly ruled by juntas and coups overthrowing each other

Bolivia has experienced most coups - 12 successful, 15 failed

Civilian dictatorship

• Don’t have an immediate institutional base of support, has to create it (unlike other 2)

  • Do so through personality cults and regime parties

• Two types: Dominant-party and personalistic

Dominant-party regime

One political party dominates access to political office and control over policy, though other parties can exist and compete as minor players in elections (Geddes)

e.g. Communist party in Soviet Union

• Next longest-lived after monarchic

• Party cadres remain loyal due to benefits that they gain —> you rise higher in the party and gain access to things not given to ordinary citizen

  • PRI in Mexico: Policies that prevent peasants from rising out of poverty, making them systematically dependent on state patronage)

• Often commit electoral fraud even if they are likely to win (facade of invincibility, deter defections, discourage opposition —> e.g. Georgia in 2000 election —> predicted to win by over 30% over his rival at 50%, but won with 80% of vote)

Sometimes, they even go so far as to restrict any smaller parties —> Zambia’s constitution states that there can only be one party, the current ruling party

Personalistic dictatorship

e.g. North Korea - Kims

A regime, though often supported by militaries and parties, that has not been sufficiently institutionalized to prevent leader from taking personal control over policy decisions and selection of regime personnel (Geddes)

• Undermines institutions so they cannot be a power base for potential rivals

• Much less likely to be overthrown compared to military —> even if factions arise, too much to risk, all spoils go to leader’s faction

• Regime personnel rotated frequently to prevent factions

  • Weak/non-existent press, strong secret police, arbitrary use of state violence, cults of personality

Cults of personality

Set of beliefs, values directed at adulation of leader

• Developed to maintain support of support coalitions and citizens

• E.g. propaganda in textbooks, media, e.g. Mao Zedong Red Book

Propaganda in NK: making leader seem omnipotent

• Usual perception: Designed to alter beliefs of citizens through gradual indoctrination

  Actually serves other goals:

• Intimidate opposition and prevent them from uprising by making it hard for them to organize and coordinate

• Helps screen out potential people via loyalty —> who is the most willing to go so far to say ridiculous claims that ruler can fly

Extra: electoral authoritarianism

“hold elections and tolerate some pluralism and interparty competition, but at the same time violate minimal democratic norms so severely and systematically that it makes no sense to classify them as democracies” —> e.g. China

Solutions to authoritarian power sharing? —> expand on how this will play out and effectiveness, example

Authoritarian political institutions can help monitor the dictator’s actions

1. Decision making bodies within legislatures and parties can provide forum for exchanging info and deliberating on policy (so dictator can’t make decisions on his own)

2. Formal rules and protocols make it clear if they have been violated

However, info isn’t enough to solve the problem:

• Need to be able to punish the dictator for violations —> requires a roughly equal balance of power between dictator and coalition (which is obtained through institutionalization) —> e.g. dictator controls executive and support coalition controls cabinet position/legislature position

What are some outcomes?

1. Strong dictator: No need to institutionalize and share power. But if there are institutions, it does NOT constrain them.

2. Weaker dictator: Incentive to share power and institutionalize. These will constrain them. —> institutionalizing can create a stable power-sharing agreement

3. Middling strength: Institutionalization will improve monitoring for support coalition

   • Balance of power equal: Institutions will constrain dictator

   • Power balance favors dictator: Constraining effect declines over time

Cameroon: Using patronage to stay in power for 30+ years

• No. of cabinet ministers continuously growing —> constantly cycling and replacing of ministers so no uprising of coups within coalition

Problem 1: How do dictators manage the masses and stop them from uprising?

1. REPRESSION!

   • Coercive tactics - targeted or indiscriminate

   • Real or threatened physical violence, arrests, assassination, torture, mass killings, exile

   • Does not constantly need to engage in repression to be effective - effective if it raises the cost of opposition behaviour, but constant use can create backlash

   • However, double edged sword - must rely on military —> can keep military weak and run risk of being overthrown by masses, or keep military too strong and expose them to opposition from military

2. Cooptation

• Rewards, distribution of welfare and state resources to control citizens and elites

• Land redistribution and employment programs make citizens well-being dependent on the dictator’s regime

• Many autocratic states allocate land to peasants but withheld the associated rights to the land

• Voters support long-lasting ruling parties to a large extent because of the fear of being denied access to these state resources if they defect to the opposition

Problem 2: intra-elite power sharing?

Focuses on intra-elite conflict

• Do not have enough resources to govern alone, relies on support coalition (armed forces, allies, elites)

• Implicit/explicit agreement on how to share rents

• Dictator always has incentive to alter agreement to benefit himself, no 3rd party enforcer

The only thing stopping dictator from usurping power is the threat of being replaced by the support coalition via a coup (extraconstitutional means)

1. When threat to remove dictator is credible, it is a contested dictatorship

2. When threat is not credible, it is a personalist dictatorship

2 assumptions:

1. Coalition has limited info on actions of dictator —> how would they know if dictator is violating agreement?

2. Coups are costly, especially if fail

Hence, uncertainty and costliness makes support coalitions less likely to rebel, making dictator likely to want to grab power

What can this lead to?

• A personalistic dictatorship can arise when support coalition fails to respond to power grabs by dictator

• If support coalition cannot monitor actions, they might throw an unnecessary coup, or become marginalized