-
1
Putting Institutions into Perspective: Two Waves of
Authoritarianism Studies and the Arab Spring1
Kevin Koehler and Jana Warkotsch European University
Institute
Department of Political and Social Sciences
[email protected]
[email protected]
Paper prepared for the Panel Conceptualizing Autocracy at the
2011 General Conference of the European Consortium for Political
Research, Reykjavik, August 2011
The mass protests that recently shook the Arab world and, in
reminiscence of such earlier springs in the region as the Damascene
Spring of 2000/2001 or the Cairo Spring in 2005 have come to be
known as the Arab Spring (Anderson 2011), not only took the Arab
and international public by surprise, but also challenged long-held
assumptions within the academic community (Gause 2011). After all,
the study of authoritarianism in recent years had mainly been
focused on explaining why such regimes as those of the Arab world
had been so remarkably (and maybe, one might add in hindsight,
seemingly and superficially) stable and resilient. The events thus
ushered in a period of self-reflection for many scholars of Middle
Eastern politics and authoritarian rule. Plagued by the question of
why we have been unable to foresee events of such magnitude and to
predict the instability of these regimes, it is tempting to
proclaim the failure of authoritarianism studies and to turn to
other fields for conceptual salvation.
Instead of joining the chorus of those proclaiming the death of
authoritarianism studies, we want to take this chance to thoroughly
take stock of the discipline of what is left of it after the Arab
Spring seemingly dealt it such a decisive blow. While
1 Parts of the paper are based on an earlier contribution to a
workshop on authoritarian rule which is published
(in German) as Koehler & Warkotsch (2010). We would like to
thank the participants in this workshop, and especially the editors
of the conference volume, Holger Albrecht and Rolf Frankenberger,
for their helpful feedback. We would also like to thank the
participants in a workshop on authoritarianism in the MENA at the
European University Institute, in particular the co-chairs Oliver
Schlumberger and Philippe Schmitter, for their feedback. In
addition, Adrienne Hritier and Peter Mair read and commented on
this paper and gave us critical input and suggestions. Remaining
shortcomings are nevertheless exclusively our responsibility.
-
2
the discipline has changed considerably over the years in terms
of the questions asked and the approaches and methods employed, the
problem of how to subdivide the space of authoritarian regimes into
conceptually and empirically meaningful categories, as well as how
to define the boundaries to neighboring areas, or more specifically
to democratic regimes, remained at the heart of the subfield. While
classificatory questions have always been central to the
discipline, the uses to which they have been put varied quite
significantly: Earlier studies of authoritarian rule in what we
refer to as the first wave of authoritarianism studies in the 1970s
and 1980s tended to see different forms of authoritarianism as
political outcomes whose emergence was to be explained by specific
constellations of political and social forces in developing
nations, whereas second wave studies from the late 1990s onwards
converged on seeing regime types as explanatory factors for regime
stability and breakdown.
External events certainly drove the many changes in the way
authoritarian regimes were studied and classified. These
developments at the same time also mirror paradigmatic changes in
the mother discipline of Comparative Politics itself. First wave
approaches, broadly speaking, relied on the background of grand
theorizing in the modernization theoretical tradition, focusing on
how processes of socio-economic change during the transition from
tradition to modernity affected political structures. Under the
methodological influence of behavioralism, moreover, there was a
strong tendency to explain macro-level outcomes as an aggregation
of individual-level factors. Second wave approaches, on the other
hand, adopted a (new) institutionalist focus on the role of
institutions in shaping political behavior and outcomes via the
reliance (in its rational choice variant) on formal models and
regression analyses. Taking institutions as independent variables,
second-wave approaches (in accordance with the general development
in Comparative Politics), both reversed the logic of their
first-wave predecessors and emphasized the independent influence of
institutional factors.
However, the considerable academic attention authoritarian rule
has received in the past decades notwithstanding, the questions of
how to properly subdivide the space of authoritarian regimes as
well as how to define them to begin with, remain fraught with
problems. While there have been some attempts to do both in a
comprehensive fashion, most notably by Juan Linz in 1975 (then
republished in 2000), work in the first wave of authoritarianism
studies barely bothered with exploring the range of authoritarian
regimes and focused on specific subtypes instead; the second wave
literature, by contrast, while producing some influential
typologies generally relied on rather truncated definitions of
authoritarianism and its bordering categories and tended to
overemphasize the significance of institutional factors, thus
reproducing conceptual difficulties that found their expression in
the debate on hybrid regimes and new authoritarianisms that are
still in the heart of debates on nondemocratic regimes.
This paper thus serves several purposes at once. On the one hand
we will present the state of the art in authoritarianism studies by
reviewing the two distinct waves of scholarship on authoritarian
rule mentioned above and by situating the development of the
subfield in the broader context of theorizing in Comparative
Politics. On the other hand, we aim to show how the current state
of the art suffers from empirical
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
3
and conceptual problems arising out of second wave scholarship.
The recent turn towards a stability debate that has dominated
authoritarianism studies in the 2000s and focused on authoritarian
institutions began to address some of the conceptual issues but
left others unresolved and hence reproduced the main theoretical
problems. We will first review the development of the discipline,
then address these methodological and theoretical issues, and
finally try to point to ways of moving the field forward by drawing
on illustrations from regime trajectories in the Arab Spring.
Two Waves of Authoritarianism Studies
Authoritarianism studies developed in two distinct waves that
differed in terms of the main focus of the respective debates. One
of the most fundamental differences between these two waves is the
degree to which the different authors take into account factors
transcending more strictly institutional aspects of political
regimes. Whereas the first wave of the 1960s and 1970s analyzed
nondemocratic political orders primarily in their interaction with
broader socio-economic conditions, thus focusing on the
interrelations between the political, social, and economic
subsystems, second-wave approaches from the late 1990s onwards
mainly restricted their analyses to features of the political
regime proper and tended to focus on formal institutional
structures. In the next sections, we provide a schematic (and
necessarily incomplete) overview over some central contributions to
both debates that together constitute the state of the art in
conceptual thinking about authoritarian rule.
Political Order, Development, and Authoritarian Rule: First-Wave
Approaches to Authoritarianism
In order to understand the emergence of first-wave approaches to
the study of authoritarianism, it is imperative to locate them
within the broader development of Comparative Politics. Developing
mainly from the 1970s onwards, first-wave scholarship was deeply
embedded in the dominant paradigm of that time modernization theory
(see Almond & Coleman 1960; Apter 1965; Huntington 1968;
Huntington & Dominguez 1975) which arguably shaped the
discipline in conceptual as well as methodological regards.
First-wave approaches generally remained committed to this
conceptual tradition, even though many authors more or less
strongly rejected some of its theoretical assumptions or
conclusions.
Thus the classical studies of authoritarianism we review here in
general shared a common interest in the socio-economic conditions
shaping authoritarian rule, although many authors explicitly
rejected the supposedly uniform relationship between economic and
political development implicit in modernization theory (e.g.
Huntington 1968; ODonnell 1973; Schmitter 1971). According to
classical modernization theory, the traditional societies of the
developing world were expected to gradually develop more complex
economic, political, and social structures in a process of
modernization that would ultimately result in the emergence of
modern
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
4
political and economic systems modeled after the Western example
(Apter 1965; Binder et al. 1971; Rustow 1967). The original impetus
behind models of modernization and political development was thus
to understand political processes in the rapidly expanding universe
of independent countries of the 1950s and 1960s by focusing on how
they tackled the supposedly universal challenges and crises of
modernization and political development.
With modernization the prospects of economic wealth and
political stability appeared on the horizon of underdeveloped
nations that could, it was hoped, draw on the earlier experiences
of modernization and political development in the west and thus
avoid some of the more painful by-products of the process.2 On the
other hand, however, such developments were also seen as posing
significant dangers and challenges to societies undergoing
modernization. Increasing levels of economic development,
industrialization, the expansion of education and social mobility,
the emergence of new social roles, urbanization, and associated
processes would ultimately, it was assumed, lead to attitudinal and
behavioral changes that were bound to exert adaptive pressures on
the political system. Since the fundamental process of
modernization was thought to be universal (see especially Apter
1965; Bendix 1977; Binder 1971; Rustow 1967), analysts were mainly
preoccupied with understanding the conditions under which political
instability could be avoided and political order maintained under
such circumstances. The link between the process of modernization
and challenges to political stability was provided by the theory of
relative deprivation (see especially Gurr 1970; also see Huntington
& Dominguez 1975, 8): The social and attitudinal changes
associated with modernization would lead to increasing aspirations
among different social groups; if these increasing aspirations were
not met by increasing opportunities to achieve their fulfillment,
the likelihood of civil violence was thought to increase.
Far from simply describing the supposed social mobilization and
resulting increase in demands for participation, many modernization
theorists actually took a fairly explicit stance against mass
involvement in the politics of developing nations. Based on the
rationale that an increasing gap between demands for participation
and a political systems capacity to institutionally channel such
demands would stall or entirely endanger the modernization process
itself, modernization theorists often saw authoritarian methods of
rule as necessary stages in a larger process of development (see
for example Apter 1965; Rustow 1967; Huntington 1968). The concern
for political order clearly trumped the concern for forms of
political rule.
Thus, modernization theory generally was based on an elitist
model of politics whereby all that was necessary for modernization
was the development of a sufficiently educated, westernized elite
that adhered to a scientific understanding of reality that
supposedly was characteristic of modern thought. This elite would
then 2 This project was mainly pursued by Social Science Research
Councils Committee on Political Development
under the guidance of Gabriel Almond that commissioned a series
of edited volumes on questions of political development that
ultimately aimed at understanding such processes against the at
least implicit backdrop of the European experience (see Binder et
al. 1971; LaPalombara & Weiner 1966; Pye & Verba 1965;
Tilly 1975).
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
5
man state institutions and successfully drive modernization from
above without the potentially disruptive interference of the masses
(Huntington 1968). Hand in hand with modernization theories elitism
hence went a strong focus on the state as instrument of
modernization in the hands of elites.
Whereas early modernization theory was characterized by a
certain optimism with regard to the prospects of a quick
recapitulation of the European experience in the new nations in the
form of quicker and less painful processes of industrialization and
social transformation for such late-comers, this optimism over the
years gave way to a more subdued vision where progress was not
easily achieved and the transition process from tradition to
modernity was fraught with perils. Consequently, hope for fast
democratization gave way to wariness about the political stability
of these states during the transitional phase: modernity breeds
stability but modernization breeds instability (Huntington
1968).
First-wave scholarship in this respect took an increasingly
pessimistic stance towards the prospects of democracy in
transitional societies and instead described how changes in
state-society interaction brought about by the disruptive force of
social, economic and political modernization resulted in distinct
forms of authoritarian rule. Elites were trying to solve the
problems created by modernization and reacted differently to
different developmental challenges. The bureaucratic-authoritarian
military regimes of Latin America were thus interpreted as emerging
from the challenges of capitalist deepening at relatively advanced
levels of modernization (see especially ODonnell 1973), while
single party regimes in Africa were presented as political elites
attempts to overcome problems of national integration and
nation-building (Zolberg 1966). In brief, the centralization of
political authority in the hands of elites and the suppression of
demands for (immediate) participation were seen as the result of
and to some extent necessary for achieving specific developmental
goals.
In addition to this common perspective, first-wave literature
was also characterized by a focus on either a specific region
populated predominantly by authoritarian regimes, mainly Latin
America and Sub-Saharan Africa, or on a specific subtype of
authoritarianism (see e.g. Finer 1988; Jackson & Rosberg 1981;
ODonnell 1973; Zolberg 1966). While these authors often constructed
a rough overall typology of authoritarian rule as they went along,
there are very few systematic attempts to capture the whole range
of nondemocratic regimes (see Linz 1975 and 2000; and Perlmutter
1981 as notable exceptions).
In our review on the following pages, we follow the literature
in adopting their focus on specific regime types clustered in
geographical regions. The discussion of military regimes thus
mainly concentrates on Latin America, whereas the debate on
single-party rule is primarily concerned with post-independence
Sub-Saharan Africa; in the last section, finally, we review some
studies on personalism (or patrimonialism) that grew out of debates
on the persistence of supposedly traditional modes of political
rule.
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
6
Military Authoritarianism
Military interventions apparently are an inseparable part of
political modernization whatever the continent and whatever the
country (Huntington 1968, 192). This paradigmatic statement by
Samuel Huntington aptly illustrates the modernization-theoretic
backdrop that informed many of the characteristic works on military
regimes specifically and authoritarianism more generally. Authors
such as S.E. Finer (1988), for example, held that military rule in
its most direct form was always embedded in a context of a low
economic and political development, whereas others such as
Guillermo ODonnell (1973) argued that relatively high levels of
development in some Latin American cases had led to the rise of the
special brand of bureaucratic-authoritarianism, combining a highly
technocratic coup coalition of military officers, managers and
bureaucrats. While there is thus disagreement concerning the exact
nature of the socio-economic conditions giving rise to military
intervention, most classical authors agree that military rule is
intimately tied to a specific stage of the modernization process
(Finer 1988; Huntington 1968; Huntington & Moore 1970;
Nordlinger 1977; ODonnell 1973; Perlmutter 1981).
The range of different types of military involvement in politics
can best be exemplified by Amos Perlmutters study on Modern
Authoritarianism (1981). Perlmutter classifies what he calls the
non-institutionalized variant of authoritarian regimes3 into
corporatist and praetorian subforms, the former of which he further
subdivides into exclusionary and inclusionary corporatism, and the
latter into personalist, oligarchic, and corporate
praetorianism.
Corporatism, according to Perlmutter, is a type of political
domination by a coalition of politicians, technocrats, military men
and bureaucrats, with the military as the ultimate arbiter and
source of elite recruitment, in which different more or less
organized and more or less autonomous social groups are linked to
the state and its bureaucracy via patrimonial-clientelistic
structures of control (Perlmutter 1981, 38 and 117). Praetorianism,
on the other hand, essentially refers to a military dictatorship
and, depending on the degree of military interference, is
subdivided into personalist (direct rule by a military despot),
oligarchic (the military ruler is dependent on the military
establishment to secure his rule), and corporate regimes (the
military is still the most powerful group, but rule is exercised by
a coalition of the military and bureaucrats) (Perlmutter 1981,
129). This scale thus reaches from military tutelage over civilian
politics to direct rule by military officers.
The exclusionary corporatist pole of Perlmutters
authoritarianism scale is further elaborated upon by Guillermo
ODonnell (1973) who is mainly concerned with explaining the rise of
regimes he branded bureaucratic-authoritarian. At the same time 3
The institutionalized variants consist in essence of the two
totalitarianisms of the 20th century Bolshevism
and Nazism as well as Fascism (Italy). Perlmutter thus dissolves
the totalitarianism category into the broader authoritarianism
category. Besides giving rise to potential theoretical problems,
empirically each corresponds to only one case, which renders the
utility of this conceptual subdivision somewhat doubtful. Following
more conventional usages of the authoritarianism concept, we will
thus in the further discussion of his argument exclusively deal
with the noninstitutionalized types.
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
7
he explicitly turns against the idea of a uniformly positive
relationship between modernization and democracy inherent in
modernization theory. Focusing on the development of bureaucratic
authoritarianism in Argentina and Brazil, he argues that the
process of industrialization in these countries led to an increase
in the size of the urbanized labor force, as well as in what he
calls technocratic roles.4 As a result of these developments, more
social sectors became politically activated, putting increasing
demands on the political system. With growth unsustainable over the
long run, developmental bottlenecks occurred that reduced the
performance of the populist regimes and led to gaps between demands
and performance (ODonnell 1973, 74). Efforts to minimize this gap,
along with the multiplication of political forces as a result of
deepening social differentiation, created new and sharpened
existing conflicts over the distribution of economic and political
power, while diminishing the problem solving capabilities of the
existing regime (ODonnell 1973, 79). The result was mass
praetorianism, providing the stage for the take-over of the
military. The bureaucratic authoritarian regimes emerging from
military intervention attempted to solve these structural problems
by excluding the working classes and bringing order to a divisive
political environment. The other side of the coin of these basic
problems of social structure and modernization is the frustration
of elite actors occupying technocratic roles managers, military
officers, technocrats who often had acquired their training abroad
and were transplanted to the context of the modernizing society.
The greater the penetration and linkage of these technocratic
roles, the higher the probability that a coup coalition will emerge
that aims at reshaping social structures to make them more
compatible with their learned role-expectations. This eventually
results in an exclusive and highly coercive regime, aimed at the
political deactivation of the working classes and the elimination
of divisive politics more generally in the service of further
economic modernization (ODonnell 1973, 88-91).
On the other end of Perlmutters scale, S.E. Finer (1988), basing
his analysis on a distinction between the motive, mood and
opportunity for military intervention, finds a correspondence
between the degree of intervention influence, blackmail,
displacement, or supplantment and the level of political culture of
a given society. The level of political-cultural development mainly
refers to the attachment to civil institutions within a given
population and influences the degree of legitimacy a potential
military intervention can claim. Thus, the higher the level of
development in political culture, the higher the standards for the
legitimation of authority and the less overt the military
intervention.5
All these conceptions of military rule whether on the
corporatist end of the scale or the praetorian one share the common
feature that the military is taken to intervene in societies shaped
by overt political conflict and mobilization. In each of these
cases, 4 According to ODonnell, technocratic roles are positions in
a social structure which require application of
modern technology as on important part of their daily routine.
To perform these roles, each incumbent must have prolonged
schooling geared to provide the necessary technical expertise. In
addition he must keep abreast of developments in the more
industrialized societies, where most of these roles originated
(1973, 30-31).
5 For a similar conception of military rule see Eric Nordlinger
(1977), who argues for a subdivison into moderators, guardians, and
rulers based on different degrees of military intervention.
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
8
the military perceives itself (and sometimes is perceived) as an
institution standing above the rest of society, either because of
their Westernized training and corresponding role expectation (in
coalition with similarly minded technocrats), or because of their
unitary and more advanced organizational character in
under-organized societies an organization superiorly positioned to
deal with the modernizing challenges their societies and economies
face. It is thus not surprising that, in addition to reshaping
their respective systems, the regimes that resulted from military
rule more often than not had a highly exclusionary character,
aiming at demobilizing their societies rather than allowing them a
role in pushing forward the national project.
Single-Party Regimes and National Integration
The conditions that led to the emergence of the second major
type of modern authoritarian regimes as seen by the first-wave
literature, namely single-party rule, were different from that
leading to military intervention.6 As Samuel Hungtington observed,
single-party regimes are always the product of nationalist or
revolutionary movements from below which had to fight for power
(Huntington 1968, 418). The classical literature on single-party
rule is thus mainly concerned with the post-independence
development of new states emerging from colonialism and focuses on
the role of dominant political parties in the processes of nation
building and national integration (see Apter 1955 and 1965,
179-222; Coleman & Rosberg 1964; Huntington 1968; Moore 1962;
Schachter 1961; Wallerstein 1960; Zolberg 1963 and 1966).7
Exploiting their privileged position as the only organized
political force, independence-movements-turned-parties in many
cases monopolized political power and established dominant- or
single-party regimes.
Juan Linz consequently discusses this form of authoritarianism
under the title of post-independence mobilizational authoritarian
regimes (Linz 2000, 227-233). In such regimes, empirically mainly
located in post-independence Africa (see Brooker 1999, 106), the
period of colonialism had destroyed traditional structures of
political domination and led to the emergence of a nationalist
movement under the leadership of mainly Western-educated elites.
Facing economically as well as socially little developed societies
with low levels of national integration, in many cases, these
movements transformed into dominant or single parties once
independence had been achieved. This process is often attributed to
the overwhelming economic strain, the difficulties of a
nation-building project in poorly integrated societies, or
perceived threats from mounting opposition (Linz 2000, 229; also
see Schachter 1961; Zolberg 1963 and 1966).
6 In fact, David Apter (1965, 396) described what he called a
mobilization system as being very likely to
transform into a military oligarchy once the early stages of
mobilizational success are over. 7 We consciously exclude the
communist single-party regimes in Eastern Europe from consideration
here since
they would have been considered totalitarian in Linzs framework.
This leaves us with mainly African single-party cases (see Brooker
1999, 106).
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
9
The process of Creating Political Order by transforming a
nationalist movement first into a dominant and then into a single
party was aptly described by Aristide R. Zolberg (1966) for five
West African cases. Tracing the emergence of unitary ideologies as
well as single-party structures in Ghana, Guinea, Ivory Coast,
Mali, and Senegal, he analyzes the transformation of nationalist
movements into single parties as well as the characteristics of the
resulting regimes. According to this analysis, the roots of
single-party rule lay in a combination of structural,
psychological, cultural, as well as ideological factors.
Psychologically, having achieved national independence, African
leaders faced a nation building project in economically poor and
socially weakly integrated societies, the sheer magnitude of which
put enormous psychological strain on them. Ideology in this regard
served as a conceptual map created by men facing an unknown
political world, pinpointing a way of dealing with the burden of
nation building in this case by instituting a one-party ideology
that defined opposition as illegitimate (Zolberg 1966, 59 and 91).
Whereas governmental bureaucracies were often perceived as alien
Western imports and partially remained in the hands of European
elites even after independence (Schachter 1961, 294), the party
represented a familiar tool of organizing political affairs and
often enjoyed an organizational monopoly. In addition, single-party
structures were further seen as supported by a cultural
understanding of unity as oneness, not as a form of unity achieved
via the competition of different interests. The party in this
regard was the organizational expression of this unity (Zolberg
1966, 62; also see Linz 2000, 229). The resulting regimes, in
Zolbergs words were system[s] of government with a monocephalic and
nearly sovereign executive; a national assembly that is
consultative rather than legislative and which is based on
functional and corporate representation rather than geographical
and individual; a centralized political administration []; and a
governmental bureaucracy in which the criterion of political
loyalty is given overwhelming weight (Zolberg 1966, 108).
It is doubtful, however, to what an extent many of the African
cases discussed in this context ever reached a level of
organization that justifies speaking of mass parties (Schachter
1961). Thus, as Zolberg acknowledges, the West-African party-states
approximate Webers patrimonial type in many important respects. The
relationships between the ruling group and their followers are
indeed based on personal loyalty (Zolberg 1966, 141; also see
Brooker 1999, 125-29; Harik 1973). In the next section, we turn to
more explicitly consider this type of political rule that has been
classified as pre-modern by much of the literature based on the
premises of modernization theory.
Neopatrimonialism and Personalist Rule
Linz (1975 and 2000) explicitly excluded regimes seemingly or de
facto based on what Max Weber (1978) called traditional authority
from his typology of authoritarian regimes and adopted the Weberian
term of sultanism to describe such forms of political rule (see
Linz 2000, 151-155; also see Chehabi & Linz 1998). Beginning in
the 1970s, however, especially Africanists and scholars working on
the Middle East began to reconsider this distinction (see
Eisenstadt 1973; Lemarchand & Legg 1972; Roth
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
10
1968; Springborg 1979). There is a certain tension between the
work of these scholars and mainstream modernization theory with the
new focus on the role of personal loyalty in authoritarian regimes
implying a critical attitude to some of the assumptions of the
first studies of modernisation and political development
(Eisenstadt 1973, 8). While under the assumptions of modernization
theory, clientelist or patrimonial patterns of behavior where
relegated to the realm of pre-modern or traditional politics, the
term modern neo-patrimonialism first introduced by Samuel N.
Eisenstadt (1973) emphasized the fact that some modern political
systems seemed to combine legal-rational and patrimonial forms of
domination (see also Mdard 1982, 179; Roth 1968).
The first author to comprehensively discuss personalism in
modern contexts (and on whose work Linz [1975 and 2000] largely
bases his own account) was Guenther Roth (1968). In Roths
understanding, personalism or patrimonialism refer to a typology of
beliefs and organizational practices that can be found at any point
of [] a continuum [of political regimes, the authors] (Roth 1968,
197), and thus does not describe a specific type of political rule.
Eisenstadt (1973), and following him scholars such as Jean-Franois
Mdard (1982), Robert H. Jackson and Carl G. Rosberg (1981), and
Peter Pawelka (1985) by contrast, describe what they refer to as
modern neo-patrimonial or personalist rule as a specific form of
(modern) authoritarian regimes that is highly centralistic in the
sense that access to power and resources is concentrated at the
center in the hands of political elites that are loyal to the
person of the ruler. The basis of regime maintenance in such orders
is the distribution of resources, rewards and access to spoils
(Eisenstadt 1973; Jackson & Rosberg 1981; Mdard 1982; Pawelka
1985; Roth 1968).
In African studies, the concept of neopatrimonialism (or one of
its various forms) became the orthodoxy of the 1970s and early
1980s (Erdmann & Engel 2007, 97), but the notion was also
widely employed in the Middle East and North Africa (see Bill &
Springborg 1994; Pawelka 1985; Springborg 1979), as well as for a
number of regimes outside of these regions (see the contributions
in Chehabi & Linz 1998). In most conceptions, the notion not
only describes a political regime, but at the same time connotes
relatively low state capacities with political control being mostly
exercised indirectly via cooptation and clientelism, but with
repression remaining an option of last resort (for different forms
of personal rule in Africa, see Jackson & Rosberg 1981). As
Mdard succinctly put it, under neopatrimonial conditions, the
problem is not development, but the maintenance of order and
survival. All the energy of the rulers goes into more or less
successful efforts to stay in power (Mdard 1982, 163).
While most analyst of neopatrimonialism or personalism agree on
the core defining features of these terms (but not on the terms
themselves), there is little agreement about whether this
phenomenon should be considered an independent regime type or a
trait of specific regimes. Taking the first position, Michael
Bratton and Nicolas van de Walle argue that while neopatrimonial
practices can be found in all polities, it is the core feature of
politics in Africa and in a small number of other states, including
Haiti, the Philippines, and Indonesia. Thus, personal relationships
are a factor at the
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
11
margins of all bureaucratic systems, but in Africa they
constitute the foundation and superstructure of political
institutions (Bratton & Van de Walle 1994, 459). Other
analysts, however, consider personalism a trait that can be found
in different forms of (democratic and nondemocratic) political
regimes and hesitate to conceptualize it as an independent regime
type (Hadenius & Teorell 2007; Lemarchand & Legg 1972; Roth
1968).
The debate on personalist rule is certainly farthest removed
from the focus on socio-economic conditions characteristic of
first-wave scholarship, although the prevalence of neopatrimonial
structures is linked with economic underdevelopment. The informal
political processes on which this perspective focuses, however,
also play an important role in the second-wave debates on the so
called gray zone. Overall, the first-wave literature on
authoritarian rule strove to understand the origins of specific
forms of authoritarian rule in terms of the socio economic
conditions and constellations at the start of the modernization
process as in the case of personalist rule, or in the nature and
consequences of the process itself, as in the case of military and
single party rule. Thus the focus of these studies was much
broader, and included economic as well as social factors, with more
narrowly political factors such as regime types being mainly
thought of as dependent variables. However, while the focus of
these studies was on a broader array of factors within the
individual countries, there was hardly any comparative effort to
delineate differences not just between countries, but rather
between different types of authoritarian rule. In terms of the
question of how to properly classify authoritarian regimes, efforts
largely proceeded inductively, implicitly based on the theoretical
question of who holds power, but without attempts to outline the
general features of authoritarian regimes and then classify its
subtypes along generally identified dimensions.
Post-Democratization Debates and the Second Wave of
Authoritarianism Studies
Several developments came together by the end of the 1980s and
gave rise to what we call the second wave of authoritarianism
studies. Empirically, in the wake of the third wave of
democratization (Huntington 1991), many nations seemed to take the
road of democratization, but frequently developed into something
that might at best be called incomplete democracies, rather than
full-fledged liberal democratic regimes. However flawed these new
democracies were, the global political changes of the third wave
resulted in renewed interest if not in the autocracies from which
they resulted, then at least in the conditions under and processes
by which they embarked on democratization. What Thomas Carothers
(2002) called the transition paradigm became the dominant
theoretical lens in the study of authoritarian rule. Under the
impression of the successful democratization processes in Southern
Europe and Latin America, the conceptual tools developed in this
context (see especially the seminal work by ODonnell &
Schmitter 1986) were applied on a global scale and produced
numerous studies on the progress of and obstacles to
democratization or political liberalization in other countries or
regions (see for example Bratton & van de Walle 1994 and 1997
on Africa, or Brynen, Korany & Noble 1995 on the Middle
East).
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
12
Despite the initially positive outlook, it soon became clear
that democratization was not on the agenda in large parts of the
world and that the End of History (Fukuyama 1992) was thus not
forthcoming. This realization spawned a series of new debates on
the conceptual level. Scholars began to develop new classificatory
tools to deal with the allegedly novel (or hybrid) nature of a
number of post-third wave regimes, ranging from so called adjective
democracies to hybrid regimes and new authoritarianisms (see
Collier & Levitsky 1997; Diamond 2002; Levitsky & Way 2002
and 2010; Schedler 2002 and 2006).
Theoretically, the gradual demise of modernization theorys grand
theorizing which sought to identify general pathways from tradition
to modernity largely independent of specific historical contexts
ushered in a phase in which the so called new institutionalisms put
an explicit focus on the way in which political institutions shaped
actors behavior and thus political outcomes. Thus, while in the
immediate tail waters of modernization theory authoritarianism
studies had emerged as a more distinct field of study within
Comparative Politics, due to the specific logic of the approach,
area study approaches dominated the subfield. This was to change
with the arrival of the second wave of authoritarianism studies
which again sought to identify the mechanisms in which transitions
from authoritarian rule proceeded via the mediating factors of
mainly formal political institutions within more broadly
comparative cross-national research designs often based on
quantitative data.
These changes must again be understood against the background of
general developments in the discipline. By the late 1970s and more
pronouncedly from the 1980s onwards, the behavioral focus on
explaining macro level outcomes as aggregates of individual level
choices and modernization theorys focus on grand theorizing were
challenged on theoretical grounds. Whereas modernization theory
sought to find similarities in the transition processes of
developing countries on their way to modernity, other approaches
started to explicitly focus on differences and tried to trace them
back to the institutional design of different polities (March &
Olsen 1984; Hall 1996, 936). Hence, a number of approaches subsumed
under the headline of the new instiututionalisms developed and
would set the tone from there on: [N]ew institutionalists moved
away from concepts (like modernity and tradition) that tended to
homogenize whole classes of nations, toward concepts that could
capture diversity among them. [] These new institutionalists shared
the behavioralists concern for building theory. However, by
focusing on intermediate institutions, they sought to explain
systematic differences across countries that previous theories had
obscured (Thelen and Steinmo 1992, 6).
The focus on institutional factors combined with an emphasis on
cross-national comparison on the basis of quantitative indicators
would thus come to be one of the defining features of second wave
studies on authoritarianism. Whereas the first wave literature
mostly sidestepped the question of regime classification, the
cross-national comparative focus of second wave studies presupposed
the construction of typological systems to capture relevant
difference. Again, efforts at delineating regime types proceeded
inductively by adding new types more or less ad hoc which, instead
of being part of a systematic effort to outline the space of
political regimes, blurred
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
FarkMac
-
13
the line between the different types to accommodate empirical
cases that were deemed to not fit either category. This process was
largely a reaction to the political changes brought about by the
third wave of democratization and the end of the Cold War.
From Adjective Democracies to New Authoritarianisms: The Gray
Zone Debate
The first reaction to the Eddies in the Third Wave (Eisenstadt
2000) that became apparent in the second half of the 1990s in this
regard was the development of so called adjective democracies (see
especially Collier & Levitsky 1997; Collier & Mahon 1993).
The debate on adjective democracies is part of the transition and
consolidation debates and grew out of the empirical observation
that some regimes, even though they might have acquired the form of
democracies, continued to lack its substance (see Merkel 2004;
Merkel & Croissant 2000; ODonnell 1994 and 1996; Zakaria 1997).
As David Collier and Steven Levitsky observed in their seminal 1997
article, this empirical phenomenon led to the proliferation of
diminished subtypes8 of democracy in the literature. Concepts such
as illiberal democracy (Zakaria 1997), defective democracy (Merkel
2004), or delegative democracy (ODonnell 1994), all have one
fundamental point in common in that they serve to highlight a
specific regimes democratic deficits by adding a negative adjective
that signals in which area the respective regime fails to reach
democratic standards: The characteristic feature of Guillermo
ODonnells delegative democracy (1994), for example, is that the
formal institutional system is counteracted by powerful informal
particularistic and patrimonial norms that severely weaken
horizontal accountability; Wolfgang Merkel and Aurel Croissant
(2000), in turn, argue that democratic deficits in defective
democracies in general are due to the existence of informal
institutions alongside a formal institutional system and
differentiate between different types of defects according to the
partial regime affected. In general, the characteristic feature of
adjective democracies is the existence of formally democratic
institutions that are prevented from working properly by informal
institutions and processes. In the context of adjective
democracies, moreover, these democratic deficits tend to be
interpreted as consolidation challenges, rather than permanent
features of alternative regime types, thus establishing an implicit
expectation that these regimes will eventually develop into
complete liberal democracies.
Partly in opposition to this teleological bias, the discussion
on hybrid regimes conceptualized regimes in the gray zone between
democracy and authoritarianism as mixed regimes that combine
elements of both fundamental types, rather than being simply on the
way towards consolidated democracy (Karl 1995; Bogaards 2009;
Diamond 2002; Levitsky & Way 2002; Ottaway 2003; Rb 2002;
Zinecker 2004).
8 We do not discuss the methodological problems of diminished
subtypes and radial categories here (for these
notions, see Collier & Mahon 1993; Lakoff 1987). We argued
elsewhere (Koehler & Warkotsch 2010, also see the appendix to
this paper) that the concept of diminished subtypes and the
underlying notion of radial categories suffer from the so called
problem of wide-open texture (Andersen 2000). In less abstract
terms, since radial categories by definition lack a core of
defining features, their extension cannot be defined sharply.
FarkMac
-
14
Although the insistence of many theorists of hybrid regimes that
such forms of political rule are potentially stable rather than
yet-to-be-consolidated democracies represents an important step,
there are also some interesting similarities between this debate
and the debate on adjective democracies. The most important of
these similarities in the given context is the role of formal
institutions. Steven Levitsky and Lucan Way (2002, 52) for example,
initially defined their concept of competitive authoritarianism as
a hybrid regime in which formal democratic institutions are widely
viewed as the principal means of obtaining and exercising political
authority, although [i]ncumbents violate those rules so often and
to such an extent [] that the regime fails to meet conventional
minimum standards for democracy. Thus, what distinguishes hybrid
regimes from adjective democracies (if anything) is the extent of
violations of formal democratic rules, rather than any qualitative
differences.9 In other words, it is the extent to which the
existing rules are observed by the actors (a question of regime
consolidation), rather than the rules themselves (a question of
regime type) that distinguishes hybrid regimes from adjective
democracies.10
The last step in the classification debate has been taken by
theorists of so called new authoritarianisms, with the electoral
authoritarian (Schedler 2002 and 2006) type being the most widely
used variant. Electoral authoritarian regimes, to use Andreas
Schedlers (2002) characterization, are regimes in which opposition
parties lose elections.11 The difference between electoral
authoritarian and hybrid regimes thus again mainly lies in the
extent to which the formal political arena is controlled by the
authoritarian incumbents and reflects Barbara Geddes (2005, 6)
warning that most authoritarian governments that hold elections are
not hybrids but simply successful, well institutionalized
authoritarian regimes. In contrast to both, adjective democracies
and hybrid regimes, new authoritarianisms are clearly located
within the classical three fold typology of political regimes (Linz
1975). They constitute subtypes of authoritarian regimes that allow
for some degree of political participation, without, however,
crossing the threshold to meaningful political contestation. In a
way, the emergence of new authoritarianisms as the (as of yet) last
step of the classification debate indicates that analysts have
almost come full circle in their conceptual understanding of the
gray zone phenomenon. Whereas early contributions emphasized the
democratic side and the dynamism inherent in gray zone regimes,
more recent work suggests that we might be looking at stable,
nondemocratic regimes that are not altogether different from
classical forms of authoritarianism.
9 On a more abstract level, another major difference is that in
contrast to adjective democracies, hybrid regimes
can be defined clearly in the framework of classical categories
(Sartori 1970). In other words, whereas it is impossible to state
unambiguously where the boundary between adjective democracies and
non-democracy lies, it is possible to define hybrid regimes by a
combination of necessary and sufficient features (see Rb 2002 for
one of the very few clear definitions).
10 If we follow a classical definition of political regimes
(Easton 1965; Munck 1996), then this in the last analysis amounts
to saying that on the level of regime types, there are no
differences between hybrid regimes and adjective democracies
because the defining rules are the same. The difference would
rather be on the level of regime consolidation (ODonnell 1996).
11 Of course, Schedlers characterization of EA regimes was
inspired by Adam Przeworskis (1991) famous definition of
democracy.
-
15
The three conceptual perspectives outlined above cover different
parts of an underlying continuum in terms of the degree to which
formal, democratic rules effectively structure political processes.
Whereas in adjective democracies, formal institutions provide the
main rules of the game but are circumvented by important actors in
specific fields (such as the rule of law in illiberal democracies
or horizontal accountability in delegative democracies), the same
rules are violated systematically in different variants of hybrid
regimes without, however, completely eliminating formal political
competition; in different types of new authoritarianism, finally,
the formal rules are violated to such an extent as to preclude
effective contestation for power through formal channels.
There are several ways to critically engage with this second
wave literature. One of them is empirical, showing how existing
authoritarian regimes deviate from the theoretical expectations
expressed in such conceptual systems. This route has been taken by
scholars working in the context of authoritarian institutionalism
(see Gandhi 2008; Geddes 1999 and 2003; Lust-Okar 2005; Magaloni
2006 and 2008). The main conclusion from these debates is that the
effects different authoritarian institutions should be understood
in careful empirical analyses, rather than conceptually
presupposed. The second way is more fundamental in that it
addresses logical problems created by the attempt to conceptualize
regime types by relying on continuous scales, rather than discrete
criteria.
In the following pages, we will illustrate both paths. We start
by showing that the idea of typological systems mainly
differentiated by the degree of democraticness produces logically
unsound categories because concept formation presupposes the
establishment of clear thresholds. We then discuss empirical
results on the functioning of authoritarian institutions that
underline the necessity to put institutional factors into
perspective and to take variation in institutional strength and
effectiveness seriously (Levitsky & Murillo 2009). In the
conclusion we take up these arguments and illustrate how a
perspective linking the second-wave emphasis on institutional form
with the first-wave interest in the social and economic
underpinnings of authoritarian rule can help us to understand the
dynamics of the Arab Spring and thus provides a fruitful avenue of
conceptual development.
Concept Formation, Institutions, and the Continuum Problem
In a nutshell, in the following section we will show how the
fact that recent conceptualization strategies relied on the idea of
an underlying continuum of political regimes not only produces
empirically doubtful results that are difficult to operationalize,
but is logically inconsistent with the notion of regime typologies
containing qualitatively different regimes. We call this problem
the continuum problem. Our main conclusions are that if we want to
work with empirically useful and logically sound regime typologies,
we should (1) give up the idea of an underlying regime continuum
that makes certain nondemocratic regimes more democratic than
others (note that already this statement is a contradiction in
terms), and that we should
FarkMac
-
16
(2) go beyond the exclusive focus on formal institutional
features for classificatory purposes.
Before we can develop this argument in more detail, we have to
briefly take a step back and ask a more fundamental question: Why
do we need concepts in the first place? What is their function in
the research process? Although it is certainly true that the issue
of concept formation in social science research has received
relatively little attention especially when compared to the vast
literature on indicators and measurement (Goertz 2006, 2; also see
Gerring 1999, 358), there nevertheless seems to be a consensus that
answering the what-is question (Mair 2008, 179) necessarily has to
be the first step in any (social) scientific endeavor (Gerring
1999; Goertz 2006; Mair 2008; Sartori 1970 and 1991). The
fundamental epistemological reason for this is that there are a
potentially unlimited number of similarities and differences
between any two objects (Dupr 2002, 61). Since this is the case,
there is at least one perspective under which any two objects can
be considered the same (Popper 1973, 376). Concept formation solves
this problem. In an effort to provide conceptual containers
(Sartori 1970, 1038), the process of concept formation forces us to
take a position (Popper 1973, 375)12 and to single out a dimension
which we consider essential in the given context, thus establishing
a system of similarity and dissimilarity relations among the
objects concerned. Only once we have decided under which
perspective we compare two objects can we decide if they are
different or the same; and only once we answered the what-is
question can we approach the how-much question (Mair 2008, 179).
Or, to put it in Giovanni Sartoris words, [we] cannot measure
unless we know first what it is we are measuring (Sartori 1970,
1038).
This last point is especially important in our context since it
is linked with a debate between proponents of dichotomous regime
measures and advocates of continuous scales (see Collier &
Adcock 1999).13 Without going into too many details with respect to
this discussion here, it is important to note two things. First,
the view that any concept could be of an inherently continuous
nature (Bollen & Jackman 1989, 612) as is sometimes argued for
the case of democracy misses the important point that if we
conceptualize a concept as continuous, this is a theoretical choice
that cannot be justified with reference to the real concept being
continuous (also see Mair 2008, 185 for a critique of this idea).
To see this, consider that such a claim would force us to accept
the philosophically quite strong position that concepts possess
some form of objective existence that is independent of the process
of concept formation. As long as we consider conceptual systems to
be the products of our own attempts to impose order on the world
(rather than to reflect an objectively existing order), there is no
way
12 Translation from German by the authors. The original quote is
Diese Skizzen zeigen, da Dinge in
verschiedener Hinsicht hnlich sein knnen und da beliebige zwei
Dinge, die von einem Standpunkt aus hnlich sind, von einem anderen
Standpunkt aus unhlich sein knnen. Allgemein gesprochen setzt
hnlichkeit und somit auch Wiederholung stets die Einnahme eines
Standpunkts voraus []. (Popper 1973, 375; emphases in the
original).
13 The debate about continuous vs. dichotomous regime type
measures revolves around the question whether regime types, and
here especially democracy, should be considered to be qualities
that are either present or absent in a given regime (dichotomous),
or rather occur in different degrees in any regime
(continuous).
-
17
of maintaining that they possess any inherent qualities. From a
theoretical perspective, conceptualizing a concept as continuous or
dichotomous is thus a choice that can only be justified by the
usefulness of the resulting conceptual containers.
Secondly, it is important to keep in mind the distinction
between conceptualization on the one hand, and operationalization
and measurement on the other. While the usefulness of
operationalizing the features of a certain regime type in a
continuous manner depends on the specific research question being
asked (Adcock & Collier 1999; Brownlee 2009a; Hadenius &
Teorell 2007), on the level of conceptualization the notion of
continuous regime types is indeed confused (Alvarez et al. 1996,
21). Either we can order all existing regimes on a single
continuous scale, or there are different regime types; to maintain
that there are different regime types and that they can at the same
time be ordered on such a scale is simply a contradictory statement
because a continuous scale by definition does not allow for
qualitative differences.14
If we look at recent conceptual discussions in the field of
authoritarianism studies from such a perspective, a number of
problems on different levels emerge. As we have alluded to above,
the different expressions of the gray zone debate, namely adjective
democracies, hybrid regimes, and new authoritarianisms all rely on
the idea of an underlying regime continuum, with liberal democracy
on the one end, and fully closed autocracies on the other. In
between these two poles lay a number of different regime types that
are conceived of as neither fully democratic, nor completely
authoritarian, but exhibit qualities of both regime types to
varying degrees. Whether this continuum is expressed in terms of
degrees of democracy, competitiveness, civil liberties and
political rights, or some other concept does not matter for the
given context. The fundamental idea remains that of a continuum on
which all political regimes can be projected (see Munck 2006 for an
explicit version of this argument).
As Axel Hadenius and Jan Teorell (2007, 144) pointedly observe,
however, [i]f the degree of competitiveness were the only dimension
along which authoritarian regimes differed, we would need no regime
typology. This observation is quite to the point. To see why this
is true and how it is linked to the problem of concept formation,
let us assume we indeed had such a scale of competitiveness and
corresponding values for all regimes around the globe.15 What would
we do with these data? Following the logic of the gray zone, we
would probably try to specify a number of thresholds that would,
for example, result in the well known spectrum of liberal
democracy, electoral democracy, competitive authoritarianism,
hegemonic authoritarianism, and closed authoritarianism (see
Diamond 2002 for a classificatory scheme that comes very close).
But how would we decide where to establish the cutoff points? In
principle, there are two different possibilities: Either we rely on
some kind of arbitrary process
14 The reverse of course is even more obvious: a nominal
variable cannot be projected on an interval scale. 15 Some scholars
tend to think of the Polity scale, the EIEC (executive index of
electoral competition) and
LIEC (legistative index of electoral competition) contained in
the World Banks dataset of political institutions (DPI), or even
the Freedom House or Polity scores in such terms. While all of
these scales certainly have their problems, our point here is more
fundamental. Irrespective of which scale we use, establishing
thresholds is either arbitrary (and thus empirically useless), or
presupposes a conceptual dichotomy that justifies this particular
threshold.
-
18
(e.g. random choice or statistical procedures such as mean or
median cutoffs, clustering, etc.), or we have to provide some kind
of theoretical justification for each cutoff point. The first
method is very unlikely to produce empirically valid regime
categories since it entirely relies on the (arbitrary) distribution
of our observations on the scale. Or, to again quote Giovanni
Sartori, [t]here is a fantastic lack of perspective in the argument
that these cutoff points can be obtained via statistical
processing, i.e., by letting the data themselves tell us where to
draw them. For this argument applies only within the frame of
conceptual mappings which have to tell us first of what reality is
composed (1970, 1038; emphasis in the original).
Thus, we would do better if we chose the second method and found
some theoretical argument to justify our thresholds. This second
method, however, presupposes exactly what proponents of the
continuum-view try to avoid: mutually exclusive concepts that can
justify why certain values should fall to the left and others to
the right of any cutoff point. These categories can obviously not
be generated by the same empirical data but must be built and
justified independently. Conceptually, the gray zone debate thus
boils down to a very simple alternative: Either we want to work
with regime types (and consequently have to give up the
continuum-view), or we want to establish some kind of regime
continuum (and consequently cannot classify regimes into meaningful
categories).16
On a logical level, attempts to use the degree to which
nondemocratic regimes are structured by quasi-democratic
institutions that dominated the gray zone debate thus runs into
considerable difficulties. At the same time, moreover, such
interpretations of the effects of formal institutions under
authoritarian rule are empirically implausible in the light of a
current of authoritarian institutionalist (Malesky & Schuler
2010) arguments that revolved mainly about the problem of
explaining regime stability.
How Do Institutions Matter? The Stability Debate
Starting in the early 2000s, scholars increasingly turned away
from the idea of formal institutions as liberalizing features and
started to examine the extent to which such institutions could
perform distinctly authoritarian functions and thus contribute to
the stability of authoritarian regimes. Two interrelated trends
combined to refocus the academic debate. On the one hand, starting
in the second half of the 1990s, the rational choice variant of
neo-institutionalism began to be employed more explicitly as the
theoretical backdrop of work on authoritarian politics (see
Wintrobe 2007). Building on the work of Gordon Tullock (1987),
scholars such as Robert Wintrobe (1990, 1998, and 2007), Stephen
Haber (2006), or Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson (2006),
developed general formal theories of authoritarian rule, mostly
focusing on the various ways in which dictators cope with threats
emanating from either political elites or from society. Whereas
most of these models were too general in nature to be immediately
applicable to empirical research, they were arguably
16 Note that this immediately follows from Sartoris famous
admonition that concept formation precedes
measurement (1970).
-
19
influential in helping to give rise to what can now be
considered a formal current within the literature on authoritarian
rule that recognizes formal institutions as an important part of
authoritarian regimes (see Carter 2010; Cox 2009; Gandhi 2008;
Gandhi & Przeworski 2006 and 2007; Lust-Okar 2005; Magaloni
2006 and 2008; Miller 2009; Przeworski 2009).
The second factor that led to a re-appreciation of the role of
formal institutions as distinctly authoritarian institutions came
from a more empirically oriented perspective informed by detailed
case studies. Building on earlier work in the Comparative Politics
and area studies literature (see e.g. Harik 1973; Hermet, Rose and
Rouqui 1978; Perlmutter 1981; Dawisha & Zartman 1988), scholars
re-examined the role of imitative institutions (Albrecht &
Schlumberger 2004) in the field of incumbent-opposition relations,
arguing that the existence of opposition actors can have functional
aspects for dictators (see Albrecht 2005, and 2010) and that
dictators use formal institutions to structure their political
systems through inclusion and exclusion (Lust-Okar 2004, 2005, and
2007). Others focused on formal institutions such as elections and
legislatures that were interpreted as mechanisms of co-optation and
the distribution of spoils (Blaydes 2010; Gandhi 2008; Koehler
2008; Lust-Okar 2006), or analyzed the role of ruling parties in
stabilizing elite coalitions in authoritarian contexts (Brownlee
2007; Langston 2006; Magaloni 2006). These mainly empirically
oriented studies produced important evidence for the fact that
formal institutions can serve important functions under autocracy
without necessarily inducing any kind of regime change.
The main conclusion emerging from this focus on authoritarian
institution is succinctly summarized by Ellen Lust-Okar (2005, 1)
who maintains that formal institutions matter in authoritarian
regimes although [t]hey do so independently of the larger rules of
the game that characterize regime types. In the meantime, the
debate on authoritarian institutions and regime stability has
crystallized around two main sub-debates. The first of these
debates focuses on the dynamics of authoritarian elections (see
Blaydes 2010; Gandhi & Lust-Okar 2009; Koehler 2008; Lindberg
2009; Lust 2009; Lust-Okar 2006; Magaloni 2006; Schedler 2006),
whereas the second mainly analyzes the role of dominant or single
parties in the context of authoritarian rule (Brownlee 2007;
Kricheli & Magaloni 2010; Langston 2006; Magaloni 2008).
Taken together, the current conceptual state of the art in
authoritarianism studies is characterized by two different research
agendas that, a common focus on formal institutions
notwithstanding, produce rather incompatible results. We will
return to this problem in the next section. Before we discuss this
issue, however, we will briefly summarize what we think are the
most important components of the current state of the art.
Authoritarianism Studies: The State of the Art
One of the most striking features of the overall debate is the
gap between first- and second-wave scholarship on authoritarian
rule. While classical conceptions of
-
20
authoritarian rule were primarily interested in the
socio-economic conditions leading to different forms of
authoritarian regimes, more recent work tends to adopt an
institutionalist focus in accordance with the general
neo-institutionalist turn in Comparative Politics. At the same
time, first-wave scholarship mainly analyzed the emergence of
authoritarian rule, whereas the second-wave of authoritarianism
studies inherited a focus on regime breakdown and stability from
the democratization debate.
It is thus surprising to see that despite these striking
differences, there has been little change in terms of developing
our general conceptual understanding of authoritarianism as a
regime type. Rather, Juan Linzs classical definition remains the
only broadly accepted characterization. According to this
definition, authoritarian regimes are political systems with
limited, not responsible political pluralism, without an elaborate
and guiding ideology, but with distinctive mentalities, without
extensive nor intensive political mobilization, except at some
points in their development, and in which a leader or occasionally
a small group exercise power within formally ill-defined limits but
actually quite predictable ones (Linz 1964, 255, cited in Linz
2000: 159). Conceptually, the state of the art in authoritarianism
studies has barely moved beyond this definition.
On an empirical level, however, there is a growing sense of
unease among many analysts concerning the applicability of this
concept to a number gray zone regimes. Rather than explicitly
rejecting the notion, however, analysts of hybrid regimes and new
authoritarianisms presuppose (often implicitly) a form of
full-scale authoritarianism (Levitsky & Way 2002), full
authoritarian control (Schedler 2002), closed regimes (Howard &
Roessler 2006), or closed autocracies (Schedler 2006) against which
the more liberal variants in the gray zone can and should be
contrasted.
The starting point for this contrast between fully closed
variants of authoritarianism and more liberal (and thus somehow
less authoritarian) regimes is the presence of ostensibly
democratic institutions such as elections, parties, or
legislatures. These institutions are seen as possessing an inherent
democratic quality and thus as inevitably moving such regimes
closer towards democracy on an imagined continuum between the two
poles of fully closed authoritarian regimes (lacking any of these
formal institutions) and liberal democracy. Thus, as Staffan
Lindberg pointedly puts it, the underlying assumption is the more
elections, the more democratic the regime and society in general
(Lindberg 2009, 9).
As we argued above, this idea of inherently liberal institutions
provoked yet another turn in the scholarly literature, namely the
debate revolving around authoritarian institutions and regime
stability. Empirically, this debate has produced a number of
hypotheses about the effects of formal institutions under autocracy
that are at least partly at odds with the perspective advanced
under the assumptions of the gray zone debate. Thus, more
institutionalized authoritarian regimes have been found to be more
long-lived than less institutionalized variants (Gandhi &
Przeworski 2007; Geddes 2003; Magaloni 2008), to be more successful
economically (Gandhi 2008), and to experience violent leadership
turnover less frequently (Cox 2009). These
-
21
hypotheses cannot easily be reconciled with the gray zone
perspective that more institutions mean more democracy, but rather
suggest that the relationship between institutionalization and
authoritarian rule is not as uniform as maintained by these
scholars.
As our brief review of the debate on formal institutions under
authoritarianism has shown, one of the main conclusions of this
current of literature is that formal institutions can be integral
parts of authoritarian regimes. Whereas this conclusion should not
come as a surprise in the case of such institutions as
authoritarian single parties (Kricheli & Magaloni 2010;
Magaloni 2006 and 2008; Smith 2005), it has also been shown to be
true for less obvious cases such as opposition parties (Albrecht
2005; Dawisha & Zartman 1988), legislatures (Gandhi 2008), and
elections (Koehler 2008; Lust-Okar 2006 and 2009; Magaloni 2006).
If these arguments are indeed valid, they raise considerable doubts
concerning one of the fundamental assumptions involved in the gray
zone-debate. If the formal institutions on which analysts of hybrid
regimes and new authoritarianisms focus in their efforts to
determine degrees of competitiveness do not function as democratic
institutions in the first place, why should we then classify
nondemocratic regimes along the dimension of the degree to which
these institutions produce dynamics that resemble those found in
democratic systems (such as electoral results)? In other words, if
it cannot be taken for granted that the presence of formal party
systems, elections, or parliaments will automatically increase the
degree of competitiveness, using these features as the basis for
classification will be of little value. Rather, formal institutions
seem to work under some circumstances, while they fail to do so
under others (see for example Howard & Roessler 2006; Smith
2005). Classifying gray zone regimes along the very dimension of
formal institutional competitiveness prevents us from asking under
what kind of regime these formal institutional effects arise in the
first place.
Authoritarianism Studies and the Arab Spring: Challenging the
State of the Art
So far, we arguably dealt with the easier part of the exercise.
Criticizing conceptual frameworks on the basis of logical and
methodological arguments, although an important part of coming to
terms with conceptual confusion, can only be the first step. Which
constructive lessons can we learn from the conceptual confusion in
authoritarianism studies? Is there a way of getting the concepts
right? Obviously, and maybe disappointingly, we cannot offer a full
fledged classificatory system that would overcome the problems we
identified in the existing conceptual tools. What we will do,
however, is to offer some thoughts on the direction in which such
an endeavor should lead.
In order to illustrate these ideas, we confront the state of the
art in authoritarianism studies reviewed in the preceding pages
with empirical evidence of different regime trajectories in the
Arab Spring. Our main concern is to show that an understanding of
these trajectories presupposes going beyond institutionalist regime
categories and hypotheses and integrating some of the issues
emphasized by first wave approaches.
-
22
Given both the ongoing nature of regime change in the Arab world
and our mainly conceptual concerns in this paper, we naturally do
not aim to give an account of the Arab Spring as such, but rather
want to point out how understanding these developments requires us
to go beyond the existing state of the art by linking existing
institutionalist notions of authoritarian regimes back to their
social origins. In other words, we urge scholars to look beyond
institutional effects and to take the non-institutional origins of
institutions seriously as factors conditioning institutional
effects (see Heydeman 1999; Levitsky & Murillo 2009; Smith
2005; Waldner 1999).
The Arab Spring saw mass mobilization in most countries of the
Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) region outside the Gulf,17
yet only a handful of regimes either broke down or exhibited strong
signs of instability.18 A more complete explanation for the
emergence of and differences between protest movements in different
cases certainly has to await both more empirical research and at
least a relative stabilization of the situation. Why, for example,
is it that the Egyptian uprising was concentrated in population
centers such as Alexandria, Cairo, and Port Said and left rural
areas (especially in Upper Egypt) relatively untouched, while
protests in Syria and Tunisia spread from the periphery to the
cities (Anderson 2011; Hibou 2011)? What accounts for the very
different role played by political parties, trade unions, and other
formal political organizations in different cases? What, if
anything, can such differences tell us about likely post-Arab
Spring developments?
Despite the fact that the situation is far from settled in many
countries and that an attempt to answer most of these questions
would thus be premature, some interesting differences in regime
trajectories are nevertheless already apparent. Most importantly at
the time of writing only two Arab dictators, Zine al-Abidine bin
Ali of Tunisia and Husni Mubarak of Egypt, had definitely been
forced out of office. In other cases, large scale mobilization led
to protracted crises in which concessions, negotiations,
repression, and continued mobilization interacted. This last
trajectory is exemplified by Syria and Yemen, with Libya forming a
somewhat special case due to foreign intervention. Lastly, there
are cases of regime stability in the presence of mass protests as
in Algeria, Bahrain, Jordan, and Morocco, and cases without major
protest events such as Saudi Arabia and the smaller Gulf
monarchies. Table 1 summarizes these differences. What we want to
do here is not so much to empirically explain these differences,
but to show how such an empirical explanation requires us to go
beyond current institutionalist approaches focusing on the effects
of institutions.
17 And even the Gulf did not remain completely untouched with
mass demonstrations in Bahrain. 18 One of the best sources on the
dynamics of protest in different countries is a series of reports
by the
International Crisis Group, covering protests in Egypt (I),
Yemen (II), Bahrain (III), Tunisia (IV), Libya (V), and Syria (VI
and VII). We largely draw on these sources which we cite as ICG
2011 followed by the Roman numeral referring to the specific
report.
-
23
Table 1: Regime Trajectories in the Arab Spring Trajectory
Cases
Egypt Breakdown Tunisia (Libya) Syria Protracted Crisis Yemen
Algeria Bahrain Jordan Stability despite protests
Morocco Oman Kuwait Saudi Arabia Stability without protests
United Arab Emirates
To begin with, it is immediately clear that current
institutionalist regime typologies do not offer much explanatory
leverage for regime trajectories in the Arab Spring beyond the
apparent connection between monarchical rule and regime stability.
There is no case of regime breakdown in a monarchy despite massive
protests in some cases, notably Bahrain, Jordan, and Morocco, and
limited mobilization even in such unlikely cases as Oman and Saudi
Arabia. Algeria is the only non-monarchical case to manage mass
mobilization without experiencing regime breakdown or entering into
a major regime crisis. Since monarchies have been treated with
relative neglect in the recent literature, there is little in the
institutionalist literature we could start from by way of
hypotheses on causal mechanisms, however.19 Nevertheless, the
connection seems to be strong enough to warrant further
research.
Secondly, turning to the different regime trajectories among
non-monarchical cases, institutionalist regime typologies offer
little leverage. In Gandhis typology, for example, Algeria, Egypt,
Libya, Tunisia, Syria, and Yemen are all classified as military
regimes based on the fact that all six presidents all held military
titles (Gandhi 2008). Even if such a classification was not utterly
unconvincing empirically (especially for the Libyan, Tunisian, and
Yemeni cases), it does not offer us any way of accounting why
supposedly similar regimes reacted differently to similar
challenges. Geddes (1999 and 2003) typology fares slightly better
by classifying both Egypt and Syria as
19 Geddes (1999 and 2003) excludes monarchies from her regime
typology and only later versions of her dataset
(Smith 2005 and Brownlee 2007) contain monarchical cases. Gandhi
(2008), by contrast, sees monarchies as a separate regime category
but offers little in terms of discussing what exactly makes
monarchies different (beyond the chief executives title). Richards
and Waterbury (1996) and Lust-Okar and Jamal (2002) both offer
interesting discussions of monarchs preference for tactics of
divide and rule over strategies of central control that they
attribute to the fact that monarchs draw legitimacy from sources
outside the political system (religion, tradition), while
presidents have to legitimate themselves within the political
arena.
-
24
regimes combining military, single party, and personalist
elements, while considering Algeria after 1997 a military regime,
Tunisia a single party regime (thus, in contrast to Gandhi [2008]
taking into account the marginal role of the Tunisian military),
and both Libya and Yemen personalist regimes. While it remains
unclear how exactly these differences are measured empirically,
regime trajectories still cut across regime type categories.
Finally, the third major regime typology developed by Hadenius and
Teorell (2007) classifies Egypt, Tunisia, and Yemen as limited
multiparty regimes, while Algeria is categorized as a military
multiparty and Syria as a military one-party regime. Libya in this
system falls into the other-category. Again, it is difficult to see
how such classifications are arrived at empirically and the regime
trajectories cut across regime types.
While it is not surprising that regime typologies can easily be
criticized on the basis of individual cases, what is more striking
is the degree of disagreement among the three most wide-spread
classificatory systems. This fact which to our knowledge went
unnoticed (or at least un-discussed) in the literature raises
serious doubts as to whether quantitative findings based on
different typologies can be easily be compared or even
integrated.20
Beyond the rather crude instrument of regime typologies, we
might turn to specific hypotheses about authoritarian institutions
to account for the different regime trajectories. Two such
hypotheses immediately come to mind: The rather well-corroborated
idea that ruling parties contribute to regime stability (Blaydes
2010; Brownlee 2007; Geddes 1999; Levitsky & Way 2010; Magaloni
2006 and 2008; Smith 2005), and the less well-researched hypothesis
that different authoritarian regimes are more or less vulnerable to
mass protests (Ulfelder 2005).
The basic idea behind the hypothesis of ruling party effects is
that as soon as dictators transfer some of their discretionary
power to the institutional processes of a party organization,
political elites have good reasons to expect that they might profit
from continued loyalty to the regime. By lengthening actors time
horizons, ruling parties allow elites to trade off current losses
against expected benefits and thus increase their incentives to
remain loyal (see Brownlee 2007; Magaloni 2006 and 2008). Jay
Ulfelder
20 This is not an effect of our cases. I merged the Gandhis and
Geddes datasets to compare the two typological
systems on the basis of the set of country-year observations in
which they overlap (Gandhis dataset includes all dictatorships
between 1946 and 2002, whereas Geddes data [in the version of Smith
2005] run from 1930 through 2000). A bivariate correlation between
the country-years classified as military regimes in both datasets
yields a coefficient of 0.28, indicating that there is substantial
disagreement as to which regimes should be classified as military
dictatorships. This is due to the fact that of the 2,475
country-year observations common to both datasets, Gandhis typology
classifies 44 percent as military dictatorships, whereas Geddes
coding rules produce only 7 percent. The picture changes if we
collapse all regimes with military involvement from Geddess
typology (military regimes, military/personalist regimes, and
military/personalist/single-party regimes) into a single category.
The correlation coefficient then is 0.52, and the percentages are
44 (Gandhi) and 19 percent (Geddes), respectively. The differences
are not as pronounced for the monarchy type. The correlation
coefficient is 0.86 and the percentage is 11 (Gandhi) and 10
percent (Geddes). The remaining regime categories (civilian
dictatorship and single-party regime or personalist regime) are not
directly comparable. Nevertheless, these differences suggest that
the results based on these two classificatory systems cannot be
easily compared or integrated because they are using very different
categories despite employing partially the same terminology.
-
25
(2005), on the other hand, has argued that single party regimes
(in Geddes sense) should be most vulnerable to mass protests
because they draw legitimacy from mass support.
Both hypotheses are certainly plausible and more or less
well-corroborated by cross-national quantitative evidence (see
Magaloni 2008; Ulfelder 2005; Smith 2005). Neither of them,
however, allows us to differentiate between regime trajectories
among the non-monarchical cases Arab cases. Both cases of regime
breakdown (Egypt and Tunisia) had hegemonic party organizations, as
do two cases of protracted crisis (Syria and Yemen), while one case
(Libya) does not have a ruling party. The presence or absence of
ruling parties thus does not seem to hold much explanatory
potential in the Arab Spring. Neither did party regimes proof more
stable as expected by the ruling party effects hypothesis, nor did
they proof generally prone to regime breakdown in the face of mass
protest as expected by Ulfelders (2005) theory. Rather, some party
regimes broke down while others entered protracted crises, but none
remained stable.
The evidence concerning other institutionalist hypotheses is
similarly mixed: The Middle East and North Africa with its history
of competitive clientelist electoral politics does not accord well
either with Lindbergs (2007 and 2009) theory of democratization by
elections, or with Brownlees (2009a and 2009b) or Hadenius and
Teorells (2007) ideas about the positive relation between the
degree of competitiveness and democratization. At the same time, at
least at first sight a linkage/leverage type of explanation
following Levitskys and Ways excellent study of competitive
authoritarianism (2010) does not seem to hold too much potential
either. In short, the state of the art after the second wave of
authoritarianism studies does not seem to offer conceptual tools
that could help us to understand the events of the Arab Spring.
We hold that this is not coincidental, but rather the effect of
two interrelated problems in institutionalist studies of
authoritarian rule. The first problem has been discussed in the
general institutionalist literature as the problem of functionalism
(Pierson 2000) but has barely found its way into the debates of
authoritarian institutionalism (but see Gandhi & Lust 2009).
This problem basically refers to the fact that many
institutionalist scholars of authoritarianism do not sufficiently
differentiate between describing the function of institutions and
explaining their existence. Rather, they tend to conclude that
institutions exist because they perform specific functions, an
argument that is both difficult to maintain on a logical level and
historically unconvincing (Little 1991).
The second problem is what we call a formalism problem (see also
Levitsky & Murillo 2009). With this we refer to the fact that
institutional form has received ample attention in recent debates
whereas institutional strength or effectiveness has not (see
Levitsky & Way 2010; Smith 2005 for exceptions). It should
certainly not come as a surprise to students of institutions that
institutional strength is an important intervening variable.
Despite the rather consensual nature of this proposition, however,
the question of institutional strength has rarely been examined by
scholars
-
26
of authoritarianism. In other words, we do not know under which
conditions authoritarian institutions are or are not effective.
We suggest that both problems can be solved by complementing
existing institutionalist accounts with what David Waldner (1999)
has referred to as the non-institutional origins of institutions.
This argument is anything but revolutionary. There is a reach
tradition of comparative historical research examining the
emergence of political regimes and other institutions that
stretches back to Max Weber and Barrington Moore and comprises such
more recent works as the Colliers Shaping the Political Arena
(1991) and Rueschemeyers, Stephens and Stephens Capitalist
Development and Democracy (1992). What these works and studies with
a more limited scope (see Angrist 2004 and 2006; Heydemann 1999;
Smith 2005; Waldner 1999) have in common is to understand
institutions and institutional configurations such as political
regimes as contingent upon the distribution of power among social
actors, whether characterized as classes or in other terms.
Although it is a characteristic feature of institutions to not
immediately adapt to changes in such underlying conditions (see
March & Olsen 1989), recent institutional scholarship in
comparative authoritarianism lost sight of the social roots of
institutions.
This produced the twin problems of functionalism and formalism:
Since institutional configurations were taken as given, the only
explanation that could be provided for their existence were the
functions they performed. At the same time the form of
institutional configurations took precedence over their actual
reach. Since the connection between institutions and their social
bases went almost completely unresearched, we just simply do