Domestic Security Capacity and Regime Resilience in Autocracies and Democracies

• In Event: Regime Durability in the Face of Coups

Abstract

Strong domestic security organizations (DSOs) often conjure up images of “strongman” leaders and autocratic repression, yet we know relatively little about how the capacity of the domestic security apparatus actually affects authoritarianism. The present study employs an original dataset on key DSO features measured at the organization level in 193 countries to systematically analyze how DSO capacity of impacts authoritarianism and democracy. I begin by theorizing how the threat perception in authoritarian states makes autocrats favor DSO redundancy, where numerous DSOs serve as substitutions for each other, which helps them preempt internal power struggles and coups. I then discuss why the threats democracies face incentives the prefer DSO specialization, where each organization specializes in particular domains and threats, and serve as a complement for the others. In testing these expectations using original DSO data and information on authoritarianism, accounting for key confounders and employing different sensitivity analyses, I find empirical support for my theory. In particular, I find that while a large number of DSOs in general is associated with a higher likelihood of authoritarianism, increasing the number of specialized organizations with strong paramilitary capabilities and greater capacity to collect intelligence is associated in each case with an increase of up to 50% in democratic resilience. I illustrate that these results are robust to serial correlation and endogeneity using GMM models estimated on a subsample of countries where variation in organizational features and their number over time could be identified. Finally, I discuss the implications of these findings and their relevance to research on authoritarianism and democratization, paramilitary organizations, and domestic security, as well as to policymakers concerned with mitigating the rise of authoritarianism globally.

Author

• Ore Koren, Indiana University Bloomington