Temporality of Authoritarian Regimes

The chapter surveys the existing research in political science and other social science disciplines investigating the temporal dynamics of authoritarian regimes. The chapter’s primary focus is on the incremental changes occurring in autocracies between their emergence and collapse, which has received relatively little attention in the scholarly literature so far. The chapter looks, in particular, at the evolution of authoritarian regimes toward individual or collective rule; at the regime cycles, caused, for example, by authoritarian elections; and at succession crises associated with death or resignation of leaders. Furthermore, it addresses the question of whether authoritarian regimes are better able to implement long-term and future-oriented policies than democracies. The chapter identifies a number of gaps in the literature on authoritarian dynamics relevant to future research.