Marius Bales
Marius Bales and Max Mutschler argue that precision weapons do not protect civilians. Indeed, in autocratic systems, they can make civilian suffering more targeted. In eroding democracies such as Israel and the US, weakening checks on executive power may also loosen military restraint Read more
Alexander Dukalskis
Many PR firms work for brutal regimes — polishing their image, attacking critics, and helping dictators cling to power. Alexander Dukalskis, Christian Gläßel, and Adam Scharpf ask: why does this happen, and what can democratic societies do to stop it? Read more
Saskia Brechenmacher
Saskia Brechenmacher, Erin Jones, and Özge Zihnioğlu write that gender is critical to understanding popular resistance against democratic erosion and autocratic hardening around the world Read more
Licia Cianetti
Licia Cianetti and Petra Alderman critique the trend for claiming that a 'global' autocratisation is sweeping the world. It is, they argue, not a homogenous process, but many processes that look differently across time and space. Just as we need to better differentiate autocracies, so we also need better language to reflect these differences in autocratisation Read more
Elin Bjarnegård
Gender and authoritarianism are interconnected – but in different and unexpected ways. Elin Bjarnegård and Pär Zetterberg think the relationship between them deserves more attention in political science. Here, they expose the relationship in terms of two autocrat strategies: genderwashing and genderbashing Read more
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 Read more
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 Read more
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 Read more
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