Crises in Authoritarian Regimes: Fragile Orders and Contested Power

Illuminates the condensation of authoritarian rule in crisis around the globe.

Crises reveal the fragility of political order and challenge the powerful. How do authoritarian regimes deal with this? In many cases, they aim to achieve two contradictory goals simultaneously preserving stability amidst crisis and reviving their political order via crisis. What are authoritarian strengths and weaknesses in coping with crisis compared to democratic regimes? What can explain their adaptability and persistence? This volume aims to assemble a broad variety of perspectives. Deriving questions from political science, history, literature studies, sociology, and area studies, the authors examine present and past regimes in Africa, East and Central Asia, Eastern and Western Europe, and Latin America. These case studies illuminate the condensation of authoritarian rule in crisis.
 

Table of Contents:
Contents Acknowledgments................................................................................................. 9 Crises in Authoritarian Regimes: An Introduction........................................ 11 Jörg Baberowski and Martin Wagner I. Contemporary Crises and Authoritarian Response A Manufactured Crisis? How Authoritarian Regimes Undermine Their Own Legitimacy¾The Case of Putin’s Russia in 2018–2020........... 29 Alexander Libman Learning from a Neighboring Crisis: Did the Belarusian and Kazakh Regimes Learn from the Ukrainian Revolution of Dignity, 2013–2014? .............................. 53 Stephen G. F. Hall China’s “Anti-Corruption” Campaign under Xi Jinping: Framing Catastrophe and Catharsis in a Never-Ending Crisis.................... 79 Bertram Lang Authoritarian (Dis-)Advantages: A Comparative Study of the Handling of the SARS and Covid-19 Crises in China................................. 115 Carolin Kautz 6 C ONTENTS II. (Dis-)Continuity of Crisis¾The Interwar Period To Hold and to Let Go: The Political Discourse of the Committee of Union and Progress in the Ottoman Empire, 1908–1923.......................... 143 Duygu Coskuntuna A Permanent State of Exception? Managing Crises in Late Imperial Germany and the Early Weimar Republic, 1917–1923............................... 165 Amerigo Caruso Triple Threat: Resource Interdependence and the Interwar Authoritarian Crises.......................................................................... 191 Rob Konkel III. Identities and Ideologies of Crisis Towards Native “Fascism From Above”: Crisis of Legitimacy, “Legal Revolution”, and the Reshaping of Polish Politics in the Mid-1930s ................................................................ 217 Grzegorz Krzywiec Reinventing Pétain: Crisis and Cults of Personality in Vichy France, 1940–1942...................... 241 Stefan Schubert Student Politics between Imagination and Action: The National Students Federation and the Anti-Ayub Movement in Pakistan, 1956–1971 .............................. 267 Meher Ali Exhaustion as Rebellion: The Identity Crisis of Salaried Women in South Korea and Kim Sung-ok’s Novella, “A Night Walk” (1969)......................................... 289 Chan Yong BU C ONTENTS 7 IV. Violent Crises, Crises of Violence Necessity, Preliminarity and Moderation: The IACHR Mission in 1979 and the Argentine Junta’s Response .......... 317 Janis Nalbadidacis South Africa’s “Total National Strategy”¾Or How to Think About the Future of Apartheid in Times of Crisis, 1975–1984................. 337 Jakob Zollmann Afterword: Emergency as Normalcy.............................................................. 365 Armin Nassehi Authors............................................................................................................... 373

About the Author :
Jörg Baberowski is professor of East European history at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Martin Wagner is a research fellow and PhD candidate at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.