Elite Co-optation, Repression, and Coups in Autocracies

Abstract

This article provides an explanation for the significant variation in coups in autocracies. The existing theoretical literature focuses on the strategies that leaders' use to thwart mass mobilization and survive in power. However, most autocratic leaders lose power through a coup, indicating that the main threats to political survival in autocracies emerge from insiders and not from outsiders the incumbent coalition. This article focuses on leaders' strategies to mitigate elite threats and argues that autocrats' strategies of co-optation and repression within the ruling elite and the armed forces affect the risk of coups in opposite ways. Elected authoritarian legislatures are instruments that leaders employ to co-opt members of the incumbent coalition and are expected to decrease the likelihood of coups. In contrast, purges of insider actors constitute a repressive strategy that depletes bases of support and increases the risk of coups. We find empirical support for these hypotheses from a sample of all authoritarian regimes from 1950 to 2004.

Beyond coups: terrorism and military involvement in politics

“…Aksoy et al (2015) show that terrorism increases the probability of coups in autocracies, which is consistent with other studies stressing that domestic and external security threats raise the risk of coups (e.g. Ezrow and Frantz, 2011; Goemans, 2008; Marinov and Goemans, 2014; Piplani and Talmadge, 2016; Powell, 2012; Svolik, 2013; Bove and Nisticò, 2014a; Bove and Rivera, 2015). However, even though coups marked the 20th century, these events are rare and affect autocracies disproportionately.…”

“…Other studies examine the causes of coups in autocracies, helping to understand how different conflicting dynamics between regimes and opposition actors within and outside the ruling elite motivate military actors to use force or the threat of force against dictators (e.g. Aksoy et al, 2012; Bove and Rivera, 2015; Svolik, 2013). Yet most studies overlook that state armed actors can intervene in politics in many ways, and that coups are only one strategy to influence government policies.…”

Fait accompli, or live to fight another day? Deterring and surviving coups in authoritarian regimes

“…Simply, it shows the negative effect of legislatures on coup success reported in previous studies is primarily driven by its effect on preventing coup attempts (Bove and Rivera, 2015; Svolik, 2012). Further, the results contrast with previous findings by showing that purging elites increase the likelihood of coup attempts, but reduces their likelihood of success (Bove and Rivera, 2015). More generally, it indicates that most factors commonly associated with coup success are found to be significant in deterring coup onset, but not affecting their success.…”

“…The coup determinants literature rests on the theoretical assumption that coups are attempted only if the payoff is greater than the benefits of the status quo (Böhmelt and Pilster, 2015) and the probability of victory offsets the consequences of failure (Powell, 2012). Thus, it follows that the decision to attempt a coup cannot be exogenous to the outcome, but it is implicitly treated as such in empirical analyses (Bove and Rivera, 2015). By not modelling the factors that affect the decision to attempt a coup in the first stage, the findings regarding the negative effect of civilian institutions on coup success suffers from potential bias in estimates.…”

Political repression in autocratic regimes

“…These papers also give references to a fast-growing field of research, only part of which can be referred to here. most ideological close supporters (Hollyer & Wantchekon, 2015), or the most productive elites (Montagnes & Wolton, 2016), it may incentivize coopted elites to convey less revolution-promoting information to the citizens (Guriev & Tresiman, 2015), or may reduce their willingness to openly confront the ruler via coups attempts (Acemoglu et al , 2010;Sekeris, 2011;Bove & Rivera, 2015). Since cooptation is costly, however, not all elites are included in the pool of beneficiaries, and a typical tool for the dictator to adjust the size of his clientele is to use purges.…”