Constraining Dictatorship

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About the Event: This book examines the creation and consequences of executive constraints in authoritarian regimes. How do some dictatorships become institutionalized ruled-based systems, while others remain heavily personalist? Once implemented, do executive constraints actually play an effective role in promoting autocratic stability? To understand patterns of regime institutionalization, I study the emergence of constitutional term limits and succession procedures, as well as elite power-sharing within presidential cabinets. This project employs a wide range of evidence, including an original time-series dataset of 46 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa from 1960 to 2010, formal theory, and case studies. Altogether this book paints a picture of how some dictatorships evolve from personalist strongman rule to institutionalized regimes. 

About the Speaker: Anne Meng is an Assistant Professor in the Politics Department at the University of Virginia. Her research centers on authoritarian politics, institutions, and elite powersharing. Her new book, Constraining Dictatorship: From Personalized Rule to Institutionalized Regimes, examines how executive constraints become established in dictatorships, particularly within constitutions and presidential cabinets. Her new work focuses on autocratic backsliding and executive aggrandizement in non-democracies. She has also published articles on authoritarian ruling parties, term limit evasion, and leadership succession. She received her Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley.