Repression, Elections, and Competitiveness in Competitive Authoritarian Regimes

Abstract

Competitive authoritarian regimes are identified as a Post-Cold War phenomenon that utilize democratic institutions, but cling to authoritarian tendencies to remain in power. I posit that these authoritarian tendencies towards repression are limited by the competitive nature of the regimes. Examining competitive authoritarian regimes from 1990 to 2008, I use data from the Varieties of Democracy, Quality of Government, and Mass Mobilization datasets to examine repression of civil liberties. Both comparative case studies and OLS regression are used to investigate repression levels over time. I observe from the comparative case studies that repression is not a tool often used by these competitive authoritarian regime incumbents. This observation is further reinforced by the OLS regression results presented. The competitiveness of elections are the critical component that is resulting in increased civil liberties within these regimes. Given these results, it can be inferred that these authoritarian leaders have choices regarding political reform. If the election is competitive, the incumbent can be voted out of office. However, while these incumbents may be voted out of office, there is still a likelihood that they may regain power in the future. The competitiveness, while a way in which these incumbents can be voted out of office, also allows for these incumbents to regain power in the future. Ultimately, this is likely the reason that competitiveness is critical within these regimes.