Lecture 9: Autocratic stability
Outline
Who is the main threat to the regime? 5
Repression creates another threat for the ruler 8
Identifying supporters and opponents Cooptating the opposition Encouraging sunk investments 11
The study of autocracy
By the end of the 1990s, we still knew surprisingly little about politics in autocracies.
Most scholarship focused on democratization or demotratic stability in spite of the fact that:
- most human beings have lived under some form of authoritarianism throughout most of recorded history
- some autocratic regimes are very stable and many are not in the process of democratizing.
There are several possible explanations:
- This may reflect the intellectual interests of the predominantly North American and West European scholars who built the discipline of political science
- It may be due to the greater transparency and routinization of democratic politics, which makes it easier to observe and to theorize.
- Another factor that contributes is the fact that autocracies are conceptualized as a residual (i.e., not democratic) mixing very different types of regimes.
Question
In the 2000s, we see a burgenoning literature trying to understand why are some autocracies more resilient than others?
- This question is related to but also distinct from the question of why some autoritarian countries democratize or not:
Authoritarian breakdowns may lead or may not lead to democracy.
- Research on this question seeks to understand how different features of autocracies contribute to their survival or demise.
Overview of explanations
We will examine several answers to this question:
• Legitimacy? We will discuss why social scientists are reluctant about using legitimacy as an explanation for autocratic resilience.
• Repression? The use of force is for sure part of the explanation. However, several scholars also point to the fact that repression alone does not necessarily lead to stability.
• Institutions like elections, legislatures, and political parties? Scholars view these are more than mere window-dressing, they have identify a number of mechanisms through which they help autocrats stay in power.
Legitimacy
It is tempting to argue that autocratic regimes persist because they are seen as legitimate.
However, social scientists are reluctant to use legitimacy to explain stability. In the preface to the 2015 edition, Lisa Weeden writes
When writing Ambiguities, one of my aspirations was to con- vince scholars to abandon “legitimacy” as a social scientific concept (p. xi).
Weeden (1999) Ambiguities of Domination Politics, Rhetoric, and Symbols in Contemporary Syria
What is legitimacy?
Conceptually, legitimacy is a “mushy” concept (Huntington cited in Weeden (1999) p.7).
Weeden (1999) distinguishes three different meanings of legitimacy
• a moral right to rule
• a synonym for popularity
• a belief in the general appropriateness of a regime, practice, or leader (Weber)
Weeden (1999) Ambiguities of Domination Politics, Rhetoric, and Symbols in Contemporary Syria
Methodological concern
A theory based on legitimacy is hard to falsify. A theory is falsifiable that can be proven wrong.
To test this theory, we need to be able to measure citizen’s preferences and beliefs independently of whether they acquiesce of the regime.
Yet, Weeden (1999) writes:
Scholars understand subjects as considering a government or a law legitimate if they act as if they do. This conflation of legitimacy with acceptance, acquiescence, consent, and/or obedience is troublesome for research on any political regime (p. xiv)
An explanation for this is that it is very difficult to measure citizens’ preferences: cf Kuran’s preference falsification.
Theoretical concern
Focusing on legitimacy is too simplistic. Weeden (1999) writes
the term “legitimacy” may be obscuring the very mechanisms of social control in need of scrutiny (p. xiv)
It is now widely believed that some citizens acquiesce of autocratic regimes even when they oppose it.
Hence, we need to understand the mechanisms that produce compliance with the regime.
Repression
Other theories of autocratic stability emphasizes state repression.
State repression includes harassment, surveillance/spying, bans, arrests, torture, and mass killing by government agents and/or affiliates within their territorial jurisdiction (Davenport 2007).
State repression
Repression obviously plays in important role in autocracies.
- terror played an important role in communist regimes’ attempt to achieve total domination “of each single individual in each and every sphere of life.” (Arendt, 1968).
- military regimes also rely heavily on repression. In South America, military government employed the systematic extermination, incarceration, disappearance, and torture of union members and left-wing party leaders and their activitsts (Stepan 1971, ODonnell 1973)
- even hegemonic party autocracies like the Mexican PRI use repression though only “truly as a last resort” (Castan ̃eda 2000 cited in Magaloni, 2006).
The fact that autocrats need to rely on repression is inherent to the regime
No dictatorship can do away with repression. The lack of popular consent – inherent in any political system where a few govern over the many – is the “original sin” of dictatorships (p.10).
Svolik 2012 The POlitics of authoritarian rule
Repression alone does not work
Yet, an explanation focusing only on repression is insufficient for two mains reasons:
1. The main source of threat for autocratic leaders is not the masses but rival elites (Svolik 2012).
2. Repression creates additional problems for autocratic leaders:
- lack of information about mass support can destablize a regime (Kuran 1991)
- heavy reliance on repression strengthen the military, which can represent a threat to the leader (Svolik 2012): Authoritarian reliance on repression is thus a double-edged sword (p. 11)
Who is the main threat to the regime?
Popular uprisings?
Arguing that repression is key for autocratic survival implies that the main threat to autoritarian leaders comes from the masses:
A typical journalistic account of authoritarian politics invokes the image of a spontaneously assembled crowd in the central square of a country’s capital; throngs of people chant “Down with the dictator!” as the leader engages in a desperate at- tempt to appease or disperse the assembled masses. Some of these accounts end with the dictator’s downfall, potentially opening the way for a democratic future. (p.3)
Svolik 2012 The POlitics of authoritarian rule
Elites?
As authoritarian leadership dynamics are concerned, an overwhelming majority of dictators lose power to those inside the gates of the presidential palace rather than to the masses outside (p.3)
Svolik 2012 The POlitics of authoritarian rule
Two problems of authoritarian rule
Svolik (2012) identifies two problems that autocratic leaders need to solve in order to stay in power
- The problem of authoritarian control: autocrats need to prevent masses who are excluded from power from overthrowing him
- The problem of authoritarian power-sharing: autocrats need a ruling coalition to rule, i.e., a set of individuals who support the dictator and, jointly with the ruler, hold enough power to guarantee a regime’ survival.
- He builds on Magaloni (2006) who had already identified both dimensions:
- All autocratic regimes face two dilemmas: first, they must deter potential elite rivals, and second, they must induce some form of political loyalty from the masses. (p.44)
- Svolik 2012 The POlitics of authoritarian rule
Preference falsification
Information about support from the masses
Another reason why repression alone is insufficient to explain autocratic survival is that repression leads citizen to hide they true level of support for the regime.
In autocracies, citizens facing repression are discouraged from expressing their true level of support regarding the regime.
Thus, autocratic leaders don’t have information about the share of the population who truly supports the regime.
Even dictators need some support from the population
No matter how great the repressive power of an autocracy, however, the fact of the matter is that it can’t control too many people simply by threatening to use force. As Wintrobe (1998) puts it, “the people have good reason to fear the ruler. But this very fear (as well as jealousy) will make many among them look for ways to get rid of the dictator” (Magaloni p.19)
Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
Revolutionary bandwagon
One way in which low information about support from the masses can weaken autocratic regimes is that it can lead to quick governmental collapse through a “revolutionary bandwagon” effects, i.e. “an explosive growth in public opposition.” (Kuran).
Kuran studies the East European explosion of 1989 (fall of communist regimes in East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary)
• These events took both the regimes and the observers by surprise • Even though, in retrospect, the collapse of the communist
regimes looked almost inevitable.
Kuran, T. (1991). Now out of never: The element of surprise in the East European revolution of 1989. World politics, 44(1), 7-48.
Preference falsification
He explains this phenomenon using the concept of “preference falsification” as “the act of misrepresenting one’s wants under perceived social pressures.” (quote from the 1995 book).
Preference falsfication occur when individuals’ public expression of their preference differ from their private preference. One illustration he provides:
When you arrive at the party, the talk of the moment seems to be about the living room’s pale neutral colors, the latest trend in interior decoration. The look does not appeal to you, but you would rather not say so, lest your host be hurt. Feeling presured to say something, you compliment his “sophisticated taste” (Kuran 1995, p. 3)
Kuran, T. (1991). Now out of never: The element of surprise in the East European revolution of 1989. World politics, 44(1), 7-48.
How does preference falsification explains revolutionary bandwagon?
Here is how Kuran’s thinks about preference falsification
- Individuals have private preferences for the regime
- They can engage in preference falsification: support publicly the regime when they in fact disapprove of it.
- This however is costly for individuals: a sacrifice of personal integrity.
- Moreover, the cost of publicly expressing discontent decreases with the number of people already expressing their discontent.
- As a result, individuals have different revolutionary threshold, i.e. a share of the population at which they will start publicly opposing the regime.
- These thresholds are not known to others.
- Kuran, T. (1991). Now out of never: The element of surprise in the East European revolution of 1989. World politics, 44(1), 7-48.
This model explains how a slight shift in one individual’s threshold can generate a revolutionary bandwagon.
To illustrate this, imagine a ten-person population where each individual is represented by his revolutionary threshold.
A = {0,20,20,30,40,50,60,70,80,100}
i.e. person 1 (T1 = 0) supports the opposition regardless of its size,
just as person 10 (T10 = 100) always supports the government. How many will eventually protest?
Kuran, T. (1991). Now out of never: The element of surprise in the East European revolution of 1989. World politics, 44(1), 7-48.
Now assume a small change the sequence of thresholds A’ = {0,10,20,30,40,50,60,70,80,100}
How many will protest?
Kuran, T. (1991). Now out of never: The element of surprise in the East European revolution of 1989. World politics, 44(1), 7-48.
Repression creates another threat for the ruler
Limits of repression
Another reason why repression alone cannot explain autocratic survival is that heavy reliance on the military can backfire.
The primary cost of heavy reliance on repression, however, is not budgetary but rather political: The more indispensable soldiers become in the suppression of internal opposition, the greater their capacity to turn against the regime. In turn, politically pivotal militaries can and do demand privileges and immunities that go beyond what is necessary for suppressing the regime’s opposition. (p.127)
⇝ For all these reasons, scholars have turned to other mechanisms to explain autocratic stability.
Svolik 2012 The POlitics of authoritarian rule
Institutions
Nominally democratic institutions
Scholarship on the role of institutions in autocratic survival began in the 2000s when scholars identified a new form of autocracies, electoral autocracies, as the most common form of autocracies.
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Since the early days of the “third wave” of global democrati- zation, it has been clear that transitions from authoritarian rule can lead anywhere. Over the past quarter-century, many have led to the establishment of some form of democracy. But many others have not. They have given birth to new forms of authoritarianism that do not fit into our classic cate- gories of one-party, military, or personal dictatorship. They have produced regimes that hold elections and toler- ate 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, however qualified. These electoral regimes do not represent limited, deficient, or distorted forms of democracy. They are instances of author- itarian rule.
Schedler 2002 Elections without democracy
Nominally democratic institutions
Scholars like Schedler initially thought that elections in autocracies served only as a democratic facade to increase legitimacy.
By organizing periodic elections they try to obtain at least a semblance of democratic legitimacy, hoping to satisfy external as well as internal actors.
Schedler 2002 Elections without democracy
But scholars soon realized that institutions were in fact playing a much greater role in autocratic stability, than just a facade.
They serve to
• Signal strength (Magaloni)
• Identify supporters and opponents (Magaloni, Blaydes). • Coopt the opposition (Gandhi and Przeworksi)
• Encourage sunk investments (Svolik)
Signaling strength
For Magaloni (2006), elections serve to signal the strength of the ruling party.
elections are meant to disseminate public information about the regime’s strength that would serve to discourage potential divisions within the ruling party. By holding elections regu- larly, winning them by huge margins, painting the streets and towns all over the country in the party’s colors, and mobiliz- ing voters in great numbers to party rallies and the polls, the PRI sought to generate a public image of invincibility. High turnout and huge margins of victory signaled to elites that the ruling party’s electoral machine was unbeatable be- cause citizens supported the regime.
Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
How?
How do voters win supermajority? Through vote buying and clientelism
The PRI developed complex networks of organizations and activities to mobilize voter turnout and distributed particu- laristic material rewards – everything from land titles to con- struction materials to public sector jobs – prior to elections.
Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
Why?
Winning supermajority helps autocrats solve both problems of autoritarian rule: autoritarian power-sharing and authoritarian control.
This image would serve to discourage coordination among po- tential challengers – most fundamentally, those coming from within the party – and to diminish bandwagon effects in favor of the opposition parties among the mass public (p.9)
Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
The problem of authoritarian power-sharing
In Magaloni (2006), members of the ruling coalition decide between remaining loyal to the regime and hope to be rewarded with office and spoils in the future, or split and challenge the regime through elections.
- Challenging the regime is very costly for elites if they loose – they loose access to patronage (jobs and other privileges accessible to members of the ruling coalition).
- Elites only challenge the regime when they think that there is enough voter dissatisfaction to have a real chance of winning office.
- By creating an image of invincibility, supermajority discourage elites to split from the ruling coation
- Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
The problem of authoritarian control
Voters decide between supporting the regime and supporting the opposition.
- But voting of the opposition is costly for voters if the opposition looses.
- They might loose access to governmental resources.
- By creating an image of invincibility, supermajority discourage
- voters to support opposition candidates.
Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
Evidence
Observable implications: If it is the case that elections plays a central role to maintain elites unity, we should see that:
• an increase in government spending around elections even when elections are not competitive
Evidence: Magaloni (2006) collected data on from 1938 to 2000 and finds “long before the 1980s, when elections first became competitive, the PRI flooded districts at election time with generous amounts of government spending.”
Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
Identifying supporters and opponents Cooptating the opposition Encouraging sunk investments
Information about supporters and opponents
For Magaloni (2006), elections also serve to identify supporters and opponents
Hegemonic-party regimes employ elections as a key instru- ment for obtaining information about the extent of the party’s mass support and its geographic distribution. The hegemonic party uses this information to screen voters according to their political loyalties, rewarding supporters with access to gov- ernment funds and punishing defectors by withdrawing them from the party’s spoils system. In doing so, the hegemonic party creates a market for political loyalty and makes citizens vest their interests in the survival of the regime.
Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
Evidence
Observable implications: If elections helps the ruling party to identify supporters and opponents, we should see that the allocation of government fund respond to electoral results. In particular that:
- municipalities that support opposition candidates should receive less than municipalities that support the ruling party.
- among municipalities that support the ruling parties, we should see more funds to municipalities that are more vulnerable at opposition entry.
- Evidence: This is what she finds when analyzing the allocation at the municipality level of a provery relief program implemented by the Mexican government from 1989 to 1994 (PRONASOL), as a function of election results.
- Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
Magaloni (2006) noted that for the PRI, elections served as a mechanism for sharing the perks of office among the member of the ruling coalition.
autocratic elections are designed to establish a regularized method to share power among ruling party politicians. The Mexican autocracy was unique in that elections were em- ployed to replace even the highest office, the presidency. In most other hegemonic-party autocracies, the same president is reelected for prolonged periods, while elections are employed as means to distribute power among lower-level politicians. (p.8)
Magaloni (2006) Voting for autocracy
Elections helps distribute rents to most loyal members
Lisa Blaydes, studying Egypt, argues that elections serve to grant parliamentary immunity to most competent and more loyal party officials
I argue that competitive parliamentary elections in Egypt serve as an important device for the distribution of rents and promotions to important groups within Egypt’s politically in- fluential classes, including family heads, businessmen, and party apparatchik. (p.49)
Blaydes (2011) Elections and distributive politics in Mubarak’s Egypt
Elections helps distribute rents to most loyal members
Elections work as a market to grant immunity to the most competent and loyal politicians.
For party cohort, the ability to limit opposition voteshare serves as a signal of competence and loyalty to regime lead- ership, and party officials are promoted and demoted on this basis. For members of Egypt’s politically influential upper class, parliamentary elections work as a kind of mar- ket mechanism for the selection of individuals who will be allowed to extract state rents in the future. In addition to the quasilegitimate benefits of holding office, elec- tions resemble an auction in which members of the elite com- pete for the right to parliamentary immunity. Under the cover of parliamentary immunity, individuals who have won office have the ability to engage in corrup- tion with little fear of prosecution. (p.49)
Blaydes (2011) Elections and distributive politics in Mubarak’s Egypt
Policy concessions
Gandhi and Przeworksi (2007) identify another mechanism: policy concession as a way to coopt the opposition.
The ruler can select the groups to be granted access and con- trol the flow of information about negotiations, all while build- ing the basis of support for the regime. King Hussein of Jor- dan, for example, offered the Muslim Brotherhood, a moder- ate Islamic group, influence over educational and social poli- cies in exchange for cooperation with the regime (Schwedler, 2006).
Gandhi and Przeworksi (2007) Authoritarian Institutions and the survival of autocrats
Policy concessions
Legislatures can serve to allocate policy concessions.
working out policy concessions requires an institutional set- ting: some forum to which access can be controlled, where demands can be revealed without appearing as acts of resis- tance, where compromises can be hammered out without un- due public scrutiny, and where the resulting agreements can be dressed in a legalistic form and publicized as such. Legis- latures are ideally suited for these purposes. (p.1282)
Gandhi and Przeworksi (2007) Authoritarian Institutions and the survival of autocrats
Political parties as sunk investments
Svolik identify another mechanism linking political parties to stability:
Aauthoritarian parties (...) take advantage of natural career aspirations to create an enduring stake in the regime’s sur- vival among the most productive and ideologically agreeable segments of the population.
How? Through hierarchical assignment of service and benefits:
Simply stated, lower ranks within the party provide most of the service, while higher ranks of party membership reap most of the benefits. In fact, most political-party service – fre- quently in the form of ideological work, intelligence gather- ing, and popular mobilization – occurs at the lowest level of the party hierarchy.
Svolik (2012) The Politics of authoritarian rule
Conclusion
What strategies do autocrats use for ensuring their stability?
- Though legitimacy is appealing, social scientists generally view is as unsatisfactory both for methodological and theoretical concerns
- If all autocrats use repression, this can’t be their only strategy. Heavy reliance on repression generates other problems for autocrats: information, and strong military
- Institutions is associated with autocratic stability and we have a number of studies convincingly articulating the mechanisms through with institutions help with autocratic stability.