What Did You Learn in This Book?
Well, hopefully, quite a lot. This book is intended to put readers on more solid footing for understanding authoritarian politics. To do so, it describes how politics works in authoritarian contexts and how this, in turn, influences outcomes...
How Do Authoritarian Regimes Gain Power?
From 1946 to 2010, 250 new authoritarian regimes came to power. About half of the time (46 percent), these regimes toppled pre-existing authoritarian regimes; just over a quarter of the time (29 percent), they toppled democracies; and the rest of...
Who Are the Key Actors in Authoritarian Regimes?
Politics in authoritarian regimes typically centers on the interactions of three actors: the leader, elites, and the masses.
The leader is the individual in charge of the regime. The leader cannot maintain this position, however, without the support of...
What Tools Do Authoritarian Regimes Use to Survive in Office?
All governments confront the difficult task of holding on to office. This is particularly the case for authoritarian governments, which lack electoral legitimacy to defend their positions of power and must contend with the omnipresent threat...
How Do Authoritarian Regimes Differ from One Another?
Authoritarian regimes sometimes can seem more different from one another than they are from democracies. As an extreme example, take two authoritarian regimes that have governed in southern Africa for the bulk of the last few decades...
How Do Authoritarian Regimes Fall?
Given the persistent centrality of notorious dictatorships to the foreign policy agendas of many of the world’s states, identifying the vulnerabilities of authoritarian regimes is of fundamental importance. One way to gain insight into these vulnerabilities is to examine...
Why Study Authoritarian Leaders?
Authoritarian leaders operate at the helm of the authoritarian political system. They nearly always wield disproportionately more power than other domestic political actors do. In many ways, they function as a veto player: key decisions require their support, and major policies...
Where Are We Most Likely to See Authoritarian Regimes?
Since the end of World War II, we typically have seen authoritarian regimes emerge in the developing world. This reflects the fact that level of development is one of the best predictors of authoritarian rule: as countries...
What Is the Purpose of This Book?
Stereotypes about authoritarian regimes are common. In the classic version, an authoritarian regime is a brutally repressive regime in which power lies in the hands of a single, eccentric individual. In some instances, this is an accurate depiction, such...
