Autocracy in the 21st Century

Abstract

Thirty years after Francis Fukuyama’s “The End of History”, the liberal democracy model is under pressure. However, a closer look at today’s autocratic challengers to democracy suggests that they do not offer an alternative model. We discuss four models of modern autocracies: China, oil-rich monarchies, traditional dictatorships based on mass repression and fear and, the most numerous one, spin dictatorships. China’s growth miracle is coming to an end—precisely because of the internal political problems that the autocratic political system cannot resolve. Oil-rich dictatorships may deliver prosperity, but their model is not replicable—at least until their imitators discover large oil reserves. Traditional fear-based dictatorships are poor and do not provide an attractive alternative. The spin dictatorships—while being best suited for the modern global economy with open borders and new communication technologies—are also not a real challenge precisely because they pretend to be democracies, thus recognizing the desirability of the democratic model among the voters.