Designated Succession: when Does It Work in Authoritarian Regimes?
Abstract: Successor's dilemma is a common problem for authoritarian leaders. Predecessors appoint successors in the hope that they will take over their power after their death and carry on their legacy. However, impatient and powerful successors can become predecessors biggest threat. In this paper, we answer the following questions both theoretically and empirically. Theoretically we show that successors will only be appointed when predecessors are able to remove them. After being appointed, aggressive behaviors of the successors reduce the chance of coming into oce as they will be removed by the predecessor. Our sample covers 169 long-serving dictators from 102 authoritarians regimes over the period of 1945-2011. The empirical results support out theoretical predictions.
