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March 22, 2023

♟️ The resistance playbook: disrupting autocratisation

Luca Tomini

Resistance to autocratisation is not limited to democracies. In fact, Luca Tomini, Suzan Gibril, and Venelin Bochev demonstrate that the main actors resisting autocratisation and their strategies vary across regime types. Analysing resistance strategies from democracy to fully authoritarian regimes can be invaluable beyond academia to practitioners and activists

February 21, 2023

♟️ Brazil’s 8 January insurrection: distinguishing coup advocacy from coup attempt

Jonathan Powell

Observers were quick to call the events on 8 January in Brazil a coup attempt. But Jonathan Powell and Salah Ben Hammou caution against conflating coup advocacy with coup attempts. Authoritarianism scholars should also note that usage of the term 'coup' has historically varied

January 6, 2023

♟️ Authoritarian practices with adjectives in China

Abbey Heffer

Authoritarian regimes are not centralised monoliths. In China, authoritarian responses to protest can differ dramatically across localities. Abbey Heffer argues that research on regime-level authoritarianism often overlooks decentralisation. Studying aspects of authoritarianism, such as protest repression and concessions, requires a practice-based approach that reconciles national and localised authoritarianism

December 23, 2022

♟️ Let’s not overlook classic authoritarians! Understanding Thailand's political regime

Thareeat Laohabut

The fashion for seeing all authoritarian regimes through the lens of ‘democratic backsliding’ or ‘autocratisation’ has overshadowed our understanding of the strategies of classic authoritarians. Thareerat Laohabut uses the case of Thailand to illustrate this problem, showing how civil-millitary relations supporting the regime have been inadequately understood

December 15, 2022

♟️ Varieties of constitutional models and authoritarian political order

Julian G. Waller

The lure of typology is irresistible for social scientists, yet commonly used schemas classifying authoritarian politics still miss key variation. Our frameworks often rely on organisational assumptions set one level of abstraction too high. Julian G. Waller demonstrates how a closer look at constitutional structure can confront this problem

November 1, 2022

♟️ Letting Agrabah go: why we must de-orientalise our approach to the Arab Gulf states

Dawud Ansari

De-orientalising the scholarship on the Arab Gulf states is crucial, argues Dawud Ansari. Commentaries and datasets generalise them as ‘monarchies’, erasing vital differences between these countries. New terms are a starting point for transforming research on the wider region – an urgent objective given new crises and freshened global interest

October 20, 2022

♟️ How regime adjectives affect policy in autocracies

Emilia Simison

We associate authoritarian regimes with certain policies. However, the relationship between regime type and policy is not straightforward – and not all transitions towards authoritarianism bring policy change. To better understand this, Emilia Simison suggests paying attention to differences within authoritarian regimes and how the adjectives of autocracy affect policy

September 27, 2022

♟️ Autocratic legalism: the ‘silent’ authoritarianism

Akudo McGee

All regimes have courts but through so-called ‘autocratic legalism’, autocrats leverage them to consolidate regimes without initially raising red flags. Akudo McGee argues that autocratic legalism easily flies under the radar because early warning signs of autocratisation are subtle. Indicators of autocratisation, therefore, need better taxonomies of authoritarianism to work

September 15, 2022

♟️ The black box of authoritarian legislatures

Felix Wiebrecht

Almost every country in the world has a legislature. They are at the centre of democratic politics, but also take on crucial roles in authoritarian regimes. Felix Wiebrecht illustrates how a multidimensional approach both helps us to understand their role in dictatorships, and paves the way for more research

September 2, 2022

♟️ Political purges and their importance for dictators

Austin Scott Matthews

Political purges are dramatic, yet common, events in dictatorships, sometimes bloody and highly consequential. By dissecting the sequence of decisions behind these events, Austin S. Matthews shows that the way a dictator goes about a purge can determine outcomes like regime survival and risk of a coup

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