Moral Hazard in Authoritarian Repression and the Fate of Dictators

Abstract

Why did soldiers stick with some dictators and break with others? In this essay, I suggest that the political position that militaries take during mass, pro-democratic uprisings is critically shaped by their role in authoritarian repression. While everyday repression in Middle Eastern dictatorships – as in most dictatorships – has been handled not by soldiers but instead by the police and specialized internal security agencies, these repressive agents simply do not have enough personnel, equipment, or training to suppress an uprising of several tens of thousands of protesters. Soldiers, therefore, are any dictator’s repressive agent of last resort.

Keywords: repression, dictatorship, moral hazard

JEL Classification: P16