Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-x5gtn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-11T00:33:59.563Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Many Faces of Authoritarian Persistence: A Set-Theory Perspective on the Survival Strategies of Authoritarian Regimes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 August 2018

Seraphine F. Maerz Open the ORCID record for Seraphine F. Maerz [Opens in a new window]
Seraphine F. Maerz*
Affiliation:
Seraphine F. Maerz, Department of Political Science, University of Freiburg, Germany
*
*Corresponding author. Email: seraphine.maerz@politik.uni-freiburg.de
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article examines how authoritarian regimes combine various strategies of repression, co-optation and legitimation to remain in power. The contribution of the article is two-fold. First, I conceptualize the hexagon of authoritarian persistence as a framework to explain how authoritarian regimes manage to survive. The hexagon is based on Gerschewski’s (2013) three pillars of stability but proposes some crucial modifications. In contrast to the model of the three pillars, the hexagon can grasp the causal complexity of autocratic survival because it is rooted in set theory and accounts for asymmetric causal relations, conjunctural causation and equifinality. Based on this, it illuminates how authoritarian regimes use multiple, mutually non-exclusive survival strategies. The second contribution is an empirical exploration which applies the hexagon and provides a case-oriented analysis of 62 persistent and non-persistent authoritarian regimes (1991–2010). By using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis, the findings of this assessment illustrate five configurations of the hexagon – called hegemonic, performance-dependent, rigid, overcompensating and adaptive authoritarianism – as those combinations of strategies which facilitate authoritarian survival.

Keywords

authoritarian persistencesurvival strategiesrepressionco-optationlegitimationset theoryQCA
Type
Articles
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 55 , Issue 1 , January 2020 , pp. 64 - 87
Copyright
Copyright © The Author 2018. Published by Government and Opposition Limited and Cambridge University Press 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bader, M (2009) Understanding Party Politics in the Former Soviet Union. Demokratizatsiya: The Journal of Post-Soviet Democratization 17 (2), 100–121.Google Scholar
Beblawi, H Luciani, G (1987) The Rentier State. London: Croom Helm.Google Scholar
Beck, T, Clarke, G, Groff, A, Keefer, P Walsh, P (2001) New Tools in Comparative Political Economy: The Database of Political Institutions. World Bank Economic Review 15 (1), 165–176.Google Scholar
Bogaards, M (2013) Reexamining African Elections. Journal of Democracy 24 (4), 151–160.Google Scholar
Brownlee, J. (2007) Authoritarianism in an Age of Democratization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Brownlee, J (2009) Portents of Pluralism: Democratic Hybrid Regimes Affect Transitions. American Journal of Political Science 53 (3), 515–532.Google Scholar
Capoccia, G (2016) When Do Institutions ‘Bite’? Historical Institutionalism and the Politics of Institutional Change. Comparative Political Studies 49 (8), 1095–1127.Google Scholar
Cheibub, JA, Gandhi, J Vreeland, JR (2010) Democracy and Dictatorship Revisited. Public Choice 143, 67–101.Google Scholar
Cingranelli, DL Richards, DL (2013) The CIRI Human Rights Dataset. Version 2012.04.10. www.humanrightsdata.com/.Google Scholar
Collier D, LaPorte J and Seawright J (2008) Typologies: Forming Concepts and Creating Categorical Variables. In Box-Steffensmeier JM, Brady HE and Collier D (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Political Methodology. Oxford: Oxford University Press: 152-173. Google Scholar
Donno, D (2013) Elections and Democratization in Authoritarian Regimes. American Journal of Political Science 57 (3), 703–716.Google Scholar
Dukalskis, A (2017) The Authoritarian Public Sphere: Legitimation and Autocratic Power in North Korea, Burma, and China. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Dukalskis, A Gerschewski, J (2017) What Autocracies Say (and What Citizens Hear): Proposing Four Mechanisms of Autocratic Legitimation. Contemporary Politics 23 (3), 251–268.Google Scholar
Dusa, A Thiem, A (2016) QCA: A Package for Qualitative Comparative Analysis. Version 2.2. https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/QCA/index.html.Google Scholar
Easton, D (1965) A Systems Analysis of Political Life. New York: John Wiley and Sons.Google Scholar
Elman C (2005) Explanatory Typologies in Qualitative Studies of International Politics. International Organization 59(2), 293-326. Google Scholar
Gainsborough, M (2012) Elites vs. Reform in Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. Journal of Democracy 23 (2), 34–46.Google Scholar
Gandhi, J. (2008) Political Institutions under Dictatorship. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gandhi, J Przeworski, A (2007) Authoritarian Institutions and the Survival of Autocrats. Comparative Political Studies 40 (11), 1279–1301.Google Scholar
Geddes, B (1999) What Do We Know About Democratization After Twenty Years? Annual Review of Political Science 2 (1), 115–144.Google Scholar
Geddes, B, Wright, J Frantz, E (2014) Autocratic Breakdown and Regime Transitions: A New Data Set. Perspectives on Politics 12 (2), 313–331.Google Scholar
Gerschewski, J (2013) The Three Pillars of Stability: Legitimation, Repression, and Co-optation in Autocratic Regimes. Democratization 20 (1), 13–38.Google Scholar
Ginsburg, T Simpser, A (2014) Constitutions in Authoritarian Regimes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Grauvogel, J von Soest, C (2014) Claims to Legitimacy Count: Why Sanctions Fail to Instigate Democratisation in Authoritarian Regimes. European Journal of Political Research 53 (4), 635–653.Google Scholar
Guriev, S Treisman, D (2015) The New Dictators Rule by Velvet Fist. New York Times, 24 May.Google Scholar
Hadenius, A Teorell, J (2007) Pathways from Authoritarianism. Journal of Democracy 18 (1), 143–157.Google Scholar
von Haldenwang, C (2017) The Relevance of Legitimation: A New Framework for Analysis. Contemporary Politics 23 (3), 269–286.Google Scholar
Hall, PA Taylor, RCR (1996) Political Science and the Three New Institutionalisms. Political Studies 44, 936–957.Google Scholar
Helmke, G Levitsky, S (2004) Informal Institutions and Comparative Politics: A Research Agenda. Perspectives on Politics 2 (4), 725–740.Google Scholar
Hemment, J (2015) Youth Politics in Putin’s Russia: Producing Patriots and Entrepreneurs. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Hoffmann, B (2015) The International Dimension of Authoritarian Regime Legitimation: Insights from the Cuban Case. Journal of International Relations and Development 18 (4), 556–574.Google Scholar
Hughes, C (2008) Cambodia in 2007: Development and Dispossession. Asian Survey 48 (1), 69–74.Google Scholar
Human Rights Watch (2010) World Report 2010: Uzbekistan. www.hrw.org/world-report/2010/country-chapters/uzbekistan.Google Scholar
Human Rights Watch (2017) World Report 2016: Turkmenistan. www.hrw.org/world-report/2017/country-chapters/turkmenistan.Google Scholar
Huntington, SP (1991) The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.Google Scholar
Isaacs, R (2014) Neopatrimonialism and Beyond: Reassessing the Formal and Informal in the Study of Central Asian Politics. Contemporary Politics 20 (2), 229–245.Google Scholar
Kailitz, S (2013) Classifying Political Regimes Revisited: Legitimation and Durability. Democratization 20 (1), 39–60.Google Scholar
Kailitz, S Stockemer, D (2017) Regime Legitimation, Elite Cohesion and the Durability of Autocratic Regime Types. International Political Science Review 38 (3), 332–348.Google Scholar
Kailitz, S Wurster, S (2017) Legitimationsstrategien von Autokratien. Zeitschrift für Vergleichende Politikwissenschaft 11 (2), 141–151.Google Scholar
Levitsky, S Way, LA (2010) Competitive Authoritarianism: Hybrid Regimes after the Cold War. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Lucas, C, Nielsen, RA, Roberts, ME, Stewart, BM, Storer, A Tingley, D (2015) Computer-assisted Text Analysis for Comparative Politics. Political Analysis 23 (2), 254–277.Google Scholar
Maerz, SF (2016) The Electronic Face of Authoritarianism: E-government as a Tool for Gaining Legitimacy in Competitive and Non-competitive Regimes. Government Information Quarterly 33 (4), 727–735.Google Scholar
Maerz, SF (2017) Simulating Pluralism: The Language of Democracy in Hegemonic Authoritarianism. Paper presented at APSA, San Francisco.Google Scholar
Maerz, SF (2018) Ma’naviyat in Uzbekistan: An Ideological Extrication from its Soviet Past? Journal of Political Ideologies 23 (2), 205–222. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13569317.2018.1419448.Google Scholar
March, AF (2003) State Ideology and the Legitimation of Authoritarianism: The Case of Post-Soviet Uzbekistan. Journal of Political Ideologies 8 (2), 209–232.Google Scholar
McCarthy, S (2010) Legitimacy under Military Rule: Burma. Politics and Policy 38 (3), 545–569.Google Scholar
McFaul, M (2002) The Fourth Wave of Democracy and Dictatorship: Noncooperative Transitions in the Postcommunist World. World Politics 54 (2), 212–244.Google Scholar
Medzihorsky, J, Oana, IE, Quaranta, M Schneider, CQ (2016) SetMethods: Functions for Set-Theoretic Multi-Method Research and Advanced QCA. https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/SetMethods/index.html.Google Scholar
Miller, MK (2015) Electoral Authoritarianism and Human Development. Comparative Political Studies 48 (12), 1526–1562.Google Scholar
Morgenbesser, L. (2016) Behind the Façade: Elections under Authoritarianism in Southeast Asia. Albany: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Omelicheva, MY (2016) Authoritarian Legitimation: Assessing Discourses of Legitimacy in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Central Asian Survey 35 (4), 481–500.Google Scholar
OSCE (2009) Uzbekistan, Parliamentary Elections, 27 December. www.osce.org/odihr/elections/67597?download=true.Google Scholar
Polese, A, Ó Beacháin, D Horák, S (2017) Strategies of Legitimation in Central Asia: Regime Durability in Turkmenistan. Contemporary Politics 23 (4), 427–445.Google Scholar
R Core, Team (2017) R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing. Vienna: R Foundation for Statistical Computing. www.r-project.org.Google Scholar
Ragin, CC (1987) The Comparative Method: Moving Beyond Qualitative and Quantitative Strategies. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Ragin, CC (2006) Set Relations in Social Research: Evaluating their Consistency and Coverage. Political Analysis 14 (3), 291–310.Google Scholar
Ragin, CC (2008) Redesigning Social Inquiry: Fuzzy Sets and Beyond. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Roberts, TL (2015) The Durability of Presidential and Parliament-Based Dictatorships. Comparative Political Studies 48 (7), 915–948.Google Scholar
Rohlfing, I (2015) Mind the Gap: A Review of Simulation Designs for Qualitative Comparative Analysis. Research and Politics 2 (4), 1–4.Google Scholar
Roller, E (2013) Comparing the Performance of Autocracies: Issues in Measuring Types of Autocratic Regimes and Performance. Contemporary Politics 19 (1), 35–54.Google Scholar
Sartori, G (2005) Parties and Party Systems: A Framework for Analysis. Colchester: ECPR.Google Scholar
Schedler, A (2006) Electoral Authoritarianism: The Dynamics of Unfree Competition. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner.Google Scholar
Schedler, A (2013) The Politics of Uncertainty: Sustaining and Subverting Electoral Authoritarianism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Schmotz, A (2015) Vulnerability and Compensation: Constructing an Index of Co-optation in Autocratic Regimes. European Political Science 14 (4), 439–457.Google Scholar
Schneider, CQ (2018) Realists and Idealists in QCA. Political Analysis 26 (2), 246–254.Google Scholar
Schneider, CQ Maerz, SF (2017) Legitimation, Cooptation, and Repression and the Survival of Electoral Autocracies. Zeitschrift für Vergleichende Politikwissenschaft 11 (2), 213–235.Google Scholar
Schneider, CQ Rohlfing, I (2013) Combining QCA and Process Tracing in Set-Theoretic Multi-Method Research. Sociological Methods and Research 42 (4), 559–597.Google Scholar
Schneider, CQ Wagemann, C (2012) Set-Theoretic Methods for the Social Sciences. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Slater, D (2010) Ordering Power: Contentious Politics and Authoritarian Leviathans in Southeast Asia. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
von Soest, C Grauvogel, J (2017a) Identity, Procedures and Performance: How Authoritarian Regimes Legitimize their Rule. Contemporary Politics 23 (3), 287–305.Google Scholar
von Soest, C Grauvogel, J (2017b) Legitimationsstrategien von Autokratien im Vergleich: Ergebnisse einer neuen Expertenumfrage. Zeitschrift für Vergleichende Politikwissenschaft 11 (2), 153–180.Google Scholar
Svolik, MW (2012) The Politics of Authoritarian Rule. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Vines, A Weimer, M (2009) Angola: Thirty Years of Dos Santos. Review of African Political Economy 36(120), 287–294.Google Scholar
Wahman, M, Teorell, J Hadenius, A (2013) Authoritarian Regime Types Revisited: Updated Data in Comparative Perspective. Contemporary Politics 19 (1), 19–34.Google Scholar
Weber, M (1978 [1922]) Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive Sociology, ed. by G. Roth and C. Wittich. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Weldehaimanot, SM (2010) African Law of Coups and the Situation in Eritrea: A Test for the African Union’s Commitment to Democracy. Journal of African Law 54 (2), 232–257.Google Scholar
Wilson, MC (2014) A Discreet Critique of Discrete Regime Type Data. Comparative Political Studies 47, 689–714.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Maerz supplementary material

Maerz supplementary material 1

Download Maerz supplementary material(File)
File 71.3 KB