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
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 Read more
Nahla El-Menshawy
Legitimacy is as vital to the consolidation of authoritarian regimes as it is in democracies, where it is more studied. Nahla El-Menshawy illustrates how regime type, ideology, and historical legacies influence autocratic legitimation strategies Read more
Nitesh Anchan
Russia justified its invasion of Ukraine mainly on political grounds, but also claimed a cultural reason: the construction of a Eurasian civilisation. To Nitesh Anchan and Priya Vijaykumar Poojary, the Russia-Ukraine war signifies that global politics in the 21st century will be dominated by the rhetoric of the civilisation state Read more
Edward Goldring
Hager Ali launched this series by pointing out that 'we lack the terminology to do anything beyond counting non-democracies'. Yet Edward Goldring argues that we sometimes struggle to accurately do that. This raises troubling questions for analyses of non-democracies – and emphasises the importance of studying history Read more
