Single Party Regime Geddes
Week 7 October 25: Regime type as a source of regime stability/instability
This week’s readings all deal with attempting to qualify the ways in which different types of regimes either support or undermine stability of the authoritarian regime. The first reading, by Geddes, is a broad survey of types of authoritarian regimes (personalistic, military or single party) how each democratize differently. Geddes finds evidence that in all cases, economic development is likely to increase democratization. But beyond this, there is a great deal of variation, between military regimes, personalist and single party regimes. Essentially, military officers, on average are more likely to support the unity and function of the military, more than they value …show more content…
Milan points to three mechanisms, the first of which is a hierarchal assignment of services and benefits. Because of the hierarchal structure of single parties, supporters are required to input a great deal of work during the early stages of their careers in order to build up enough credibility within the regime to be promoted to the higher levels and there receive the benefits of their work, thus supporting any transition away from the party would represent a lose of all the costs already sunk into advancement. Political control over appointments is also necessary since it increases the possible realm of benefits that can be distributed by the party. Finally, selective recruitment, promotion and repression is important because the costs of co-opting oppositions is higher than co-opting those who are more proximate to the party.
Chehabi and Linz discuss sultanistic regimes, which are an extreme form of personalistic authoritarianism where loyalty is motivated by fear and rewards to followers. It is not characterized by any system of ideology, and as such the leader is free to act in any way that they choose. Sultanistic regimes also generally greatly violate the norms of bureaucratic administration, as what ultimately matters for promotion is the favour of the
This week’s readings all deal with attempting to qualify the ways in which different types of regimes either support or undermine stability of the authoritarian regime. The first reading, by Geddes, is a broad survey of types of authoritarian regimes (personalistic, military or single party) how each democratize differently. Geddes finds evidence that in all cases, economic development is likely to increase democratization. But beyond this, there is a great deal of variation, between military regimes, personalist and single party regimes. Essentially, military officers, on average are more likely to support the unity and function of the military, more than they value …show more content…
Milan points to three mechanisms, the first of which is a hierarchal assignment of services and benefits. Because of the hierarchal structure of single parties, supporters are required to input a great deal of work during the early stages of their careers in order to build up enough credibility within the regime to be promoted to the higher levels and there receive the benefits of their work, thus supporting any transition away from the party would represent a lose of all the costs already sunk into advancement. Political control over appointments is also necessary since it increases the possible realm of benefits that can be distributed by the party. Finally, selective recruitment, promotion and repression is important because the costs of co-opting oppositions is higher than co-opting those who are more proximate to the party.
Chehabi and Linz discuss sultanistic regimes, which are an extreme form of personalistic authoritarianism where loyalty is motivated by fear and rewards to followers. It is not characterized by any system of ideology, and as such the leader is free to act in any way that they choose. Sultanistic regimes also generally greatly violate the norms of bureaucratic administration, as what ultimately matters for promotion is the favour of the