Abstract
Although the literature on transitions from neopatrimonial regimes provides many accounts of chaotic breakdown, it seldom explains why some personalistic regimes survive the kinds of intense domestic crises that topple similar systems. This article introduces cases of regime restabilization to a previous analysis of change, showing that while patrimonial authority often isolates leaders and provokes unrest, extensive patrimonial ties can help the regime endure these same challenges and defeat its domestic foes. Specifically, when their repressive capacity is not inhibited by foreign powers during crises, neopatrimonial leaders can withstand insurgencies and prevent regime change. Building upon Richard Snyder's study of neopatrimonial transitions, I explore this argument through a variable of “hard-liner” strength derived from the regime's domestic patrimonial networks and its relationship to a foreign patron. Adding four original case studies of enduring neopatrimonialism (Syria, Iraq, Libya, Tunisia) to Snyder’s prior work, I find the revised voluntarist framework explains both transition and restabilization in a composite set of fifteen cases.
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Jason Brownlee is a Ph.D. candidate in the Politics Department of Princeton, University. His dissertation examines the causes of regime change and stability in electoral authoritarian systems.
For constructive feedback on earlier versions of this article, I thank Michele Penner Angrist, Nancy Bermeo, Mac Brownlee, Ellis Goldberg Fred Greenstein, Atul, Kohli, James Mahoney, Dan Slater, Richard Snyder, David Waldner, the participants of the Comparative Politics Research Seminar at Princeton University, and two anonymous reviewers.
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Brownlee, J. …And yet they persist: Explaining survival and transition in neopatrimonial regimes. St Comp Int Dev 37, 35–63 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02686230
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02686230