Regime and Leader Instability Under Two Forms of Military Rule

Abstract

The finding that military regimes are more fragile than other authoritarian regimes represents one of the few stylized facts in comparative politics. However, the existing literature contains substantial differences in the theoretical explanations for military regime instability and operationalizations of military rule. To assess competing explanations, we examine regime and leader instability after distinguishing between collegial and personalist military rule. We show that regime and leader insecurity characterize only collegial military regimes. Particularly, the fragility of collegial military regimes comes from a heightened likelihood of democratization, not more frequent transitions to alternative autocratic regimes. In addition, leaders of collegial military regimes face higher risks of both regular and irregular turnovers than other autocrats. Also, irregular exits of collegial military leaders tend to occur through reshuffling, rather than regime-changing, coups. The results strongly support theories focusing on military officers’ preference for unity over other explanations.

External Territorial Threats and Military Regimes

“…This study contributes to the literature on military dictatorships by presenting the first systematic evidence that external territorial threats foster collegial military rule. It confirms the importance of distinguishing between collegial military rule and military strongman rule, which is emphasized by previous studies by and Kim and Kroeger (2018). This study shows that collegial military rule is established in a manner clearly distinct from that by which military strongman rule is established.…”

How to Sell a Coup: Elections as Coup Legitimation

“…While existing accounts tend to attribute the fragility of military regimes to officers' desire for unity (Geddes 1999(Geddes , 2003 or their ability to secure improved posttenure fates under democracy (Debs 2016), more recent work suggests that military regimes collapse because they are more likely to face protests and crises of legitimacy than civilian regimes (Malik and Williamson 2017). Moreover, as Kim and Kroeger (2017) observe, there remains substantial variation in the duration of military regimes, with some surviving as long as their civilian counterparts. Much of this variation can be explained by coup leaders' levels of domestic and international legitimacy.…”

Previous Military Rule and Democratic Survival

“…Mobutu Sese Seko's regime in Zaire, Rafael Trujillo's regime (1930-1961 in the Dominican Republic, and the Gaddafi regime in Libya are notable examples of personalist military rule. Kim and Kroeger (2018) show that the distinction between collegial and personalist military rule is important when studying the effect of military rule on regime and leadership survival. Specifically, they find that the stylized facts of regime and leader instability under military rule only characterize collegial military rule.…”

“…Outgoing military elites' continuing political power is further strengthened by the transitional mode of military dictatorships. As Geddes (1999) argues, collegial military dictatorships are more likely than other types of dictatorships to democratize through negotiations (see also Kim and Kroeger 2018). Contrarily, personalist dictatorships, including military ones, tend to be very resistant to democratization and refuse negotiations since regime elites in personalist dictatorships will likely lose all privileges they enjoy after regime change.…”