2B RED: The economics of dictators🍋
Plenty of reading on an endlessly fascinating topic
Do dictators arise because of economic conditions? What impact do dictatorships have on a country’s economic performance? Is democracy on the wane? Are dictators becoming the norm? Are there common personal characteristics of those who seek and maintain dictatorial power? Are dictatorial rulers always malevolent?
This column will address at least some of these questions, but its aim is more to guide the interested reader towards some significant works that delve much further into the murky field of dictatorships.
There are now some 52 countries with dictators, which is actually down somewhat from the numbers in the 1970s. However, an estimated 72% of the world’s population currently lives under some form of dictatorship. But like all statistics, we need to be clear about what is being measured.
Dictatorship? Or merely authoritarian rule …
Authoritarian rule and dictatorship are sometimes used interchangeably. This is understandable, as typically both imply government by a single ruler who has unbridled power and whose decisions are not subject to the rule of law. Unlike many (perhaps most) dictators, authoritarian rulers are not necessarily malevolent; they might genuinely strive for what they believe is in the interests of their subjects. However, typically the freedoms of those subjects are severely constrained, and they have little or no say in government decision-making. Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew and the Sultan of Oman are seen as fitting that model.
Because of the challenges of defining “dictatorship”, the data can give only approximate estimates. In round numbers, since 1900 there have been 200 military or violent coups and some 100 “legal” takeovers. The highest number of dictator leaders has been in Sub-Saharan Africa (e.g. Amin in Uganda, Mobutu in the Congo) and Latin America (Pinochet in Chile, Castro in Cuba).
Are dictators always male? No: there are numerous examples throughout history of female dictators: Empress Wu Zetian of China; Queen Ranavalona I of Madagascar; Indira Gandhi in India (during her State of Emergency); Catherine the Great of Russia; Queen Mary I of England; and Isabel Peron of Argentina.
The type of dictatorship a country is ruled by typically comes down to the methods the dictator used to obtain power and how they maintain it. Natasha M. Ezrow and Erica Frantz, Dictators and Dictatorships: Understanding Authoritarian Regimes and Their Leaders (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2011), identify five types:
Military dictatorship — power is obtained and maintained through military might.
Monarchy — power is obtained and passed on through family connections.
Personal dictatorship — a leader who may be supported by a party or military, but still retains the overwhelming majority of power, and places those loyal to the leader in positions of power (whether or not qualified).
Single-party dictatorship — a one-party state which makes all the rules and controls elections, so they win every time.
Hybrid dictatorship — involving elements of some of the above, e.g. a single-party dictatorship with a powerful leader.
Economic Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy, by Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson (Cambridge University Press, 2005), is arguably still one of the most significant contributions — a blend of political science, economics and development. They employ the standard tools of economics and rely on incentives and game theory to analyse the path to democratic or non-democratic political systems (along with a good dose of mathematics, which generally simply restates the obvious).
They build their analysis on the premise that society can be divided into the “elite” and the “people”, and each struggle for power and control of resources. They illustrate four pathways with selected examples.
From non-democracy gradually but inexorably leading to a sustainable democracy (e.g. Britain)
Where democracy is created but soon collapses (e.g. Argentina)
Where non-democracy is sustained and stable because society is relatively egalitarian and prosperous (e.g. Singapore)
A society so highly unequal and exploitative that any prospect of democracy is so threatening to the elite that they employ repressive means and violence to avoid it (e.g. South Africa prior to the collapse of the apartheid regime).
The characteristics of dictators
So what are some of the characteristics of dictators? John Gartner, a US psychologist, identifies them as malignant narcissists.
He attributes this term to the psychologist Erich Fromm, a German Jew who escaped from the Nazis. In his book Escape from Freedom (Farrar and Rinehart, 1941), Fromm developed the theory that people accept authoritarian rule as it provides structure and certainty in their lives, in contrast to a world of individual freedoms. Fromm used this concept to explain (in part) the rise of Hitler after the chaotic period in Germany following World War I.
A similar period of unrest and political instability occurred in Italy, and together with a fear of communism proved fertile ground for the rise of Mussolini, a fascist dictator. The account by Donald Sassoon, Mussolini and the Rise of Fascism (HarperCollins, 2007), is consistent with Fromm’s thesis that the calm, order, and structure of society under authoritarian rule was preferable to the previous chaos, even at the cost of loss of some freedoms.
Military dictators typically impose strict order (ever noticed that the rocks on the roadsides in the base are painted white!) and the result is often a greatly improved level of public safety. When I lived in Colombia, a Chilean colleague and his family would return to Pinochet’s Chile on leave, and on return report how much safer and freer they were in Santiago than in Cali, Colombia.
The dictator personality type
Let me return to Fromm’s defining characteristics of the personality type of dictators:
There is perhaps no better case that embodies virtually every one of those characteristics than Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina, who took over the presidency of the Dominican Republic in a military coup in 1930 and ruled until his assassination in 1961, as documented in Robert D. Crassweller, Trujillo: The Life and Times of a Caribbean Dictator (Plunkett Lake Press, 2023).
Trujillo came to power by overthrowing a corrupt and incompetent President, Horacio Vásquez. There began one of the most violent and brutal regimes inflicted on a small island nation. He was called “the goat” by his enemies because it symbolised his gluttony and insatiable sexual appetite.
He hated Black people and immigrants — these were mostly Haitian farm workers who came to work on sugar plantations. He accused them (falsely) of being criminals and rapists, and he ordered the mass slaughter of some 20,000. The event is known as the Parsley Massacre. Dominican soldiers would (supposedly?) hold up two sprigs of parsley and ask a suspect to pronounce the name of it. Should they answer in French (persil) rather than in Spanish (perejil) they were shot instantly.
Trujillo demanded total loyalty, and any courtier suspected of the slightest disloyalty was summarily executed; as were Dominican nationals in exile in Cuba and the USA suspected of organising rebellion against the Trujillo government. He was exceedingly vain: always impeccably dressed — he had over 2,000 military dress uniforms. He renamed Santo Domingo, the capital city, as Ciudad Trujillo, he also renamed a province and the Republic’s highest mountain after himself. He built an extravagant palace and owned several mansions. He had some 2,000 statues of himself erected throughout the country. He required the priests to insert the following into any prayer used in the churches: “You are requested to pray for the health of Generalissimo Trujillo, the benefactor of the country.”
The country was turned into a total kleptocracy. Trujillo expropriated plantations, mines, cattle farms, and endless businesses. At his death, 111 companies were in his name or that of his family members, and it is estimated he controlled or owned 60% of the national GDP.
Perhaps surprisingly, even in the case of Trujillo, there were some positive aspects. He invested in education, health services and infrastructure, perhaps (cynically) as a way to build popular support and defuse any potential rebellions.
Can dictators do good?
This brings us to a question: do dictators ever do any good? A comprehensive analysis of the economic data has been undertaken by Stephanie M. Rizio and Ahmed Skali in How often do dictators have positive economic effects? Global evidence 1858-2010.1
Supposedly well-intentioned dictators are often cited as drivers of economic growth. We examine this claim in a panel of 133 countries from 1858 to 2010. Using annual data on economic growth, political regimes, and political leaders, we document a robust asymmetric pattern: growth-positive autocrats (autocrats whose countries experience larger-than-average growth) are found only as frequently as would be predicted by chance. In contrast, growth-negative autocrats are found significantly more frequently.
These results are not surprising. Expropriation and nationalisation of enterprises create uncertainty and discourage investment, both domestic and foreign; they remove competitive forces and lead to inefficiency; they misallocate resources away from their most efficient uses; and they encourage rent seeking by sycophants.
Life after dictatorship
The removal of a dictator is not necessarily accompanied by a return to economic order and efficiency. In fact, removal is typically followed by civil unrest, political instability, and chaos rather than sunshine and roses, to varying degrees. No better illustration exists than the case of the Congo. In the later part of the nineteenth century, King Leopold II of Belgium was the founder and sole owner of the so-called Congo Free State. He plundered the Congo and around 10 million of its people died of murder, mutilation, torture, and slavery — as explained by Adam Hochschild in King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa (Mariner Books Classics, 2020).
Under the dictatorship of King Leopold, the rule of law and respect for property rights were absent; institutions were weakened or eliminated, and investment in human capital was virtually nil. By the end of his rule, the Congo had 60 university graduates, mostly in exile. This is amply documented in David van Reybrouck, Congo: The Epic History of a People (Ecco, 2015). The consequence was that even well-intentioned post-colonial leaders faced an almost impossible task. Civil unrest resulted in the country’s Prime Minister, Patrice Lumumba, being assassinated within a year of taking office, as detailed in Patrice Lumumba: The Life and Legacy of the Pan-African Politician who became Congo’s First Prime Minister (Charles River Editors, 2019).
Anne Applebaum introduces a new form of autocracy in Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World (Penguin, 2024). Rather than the stereotype bad guy, she argues that in today’s world a consortium of corporations and financial institutions dominate and control much of society. Applebaum’s thesis is reminiscent of the argument made in 1967 by John Kenneth Galbraith in The New Industrial State (Princeton University Press, 2015). He argued that the United States was no longer a competitive free-market economy (was it ever?) but one dominated by large corporations, who controlled both the supply side and “created a need” for new products among consumers. A permissive regulatory environment allowed them to flourish.
And on a lighter note
Victoria Clark and Melissa Scott, Dictators’ Dinners: A Bad Taste Guide to Entertaining Tyrants (Gilgamesh Pr Ltd, 2014), explore the food eaten by dictators from the gluttonous to the frugal.
In a similar vein, Witold Szabłowski covers much of the history of modern Russia as seen through interviews with chefs in What’s Cooking in the Kremlin: From Rasputin to Putin, How Russia Built an Empire with a Knife and Fork (Penguin, 2023).
Finally, Peter York has two books: Dictator Style: Lifestyles of the World’s Most Colorful Despots, and Dictators’ Homes. Both highlight the almost universal appalling lack of taste displayed in the palaces (ballrooms?) they built and the furnishings therein.
All your favourite dictators are here: Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Tito, Mussolini, Mobutu, Idi Amin, Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos, each with their own uniquely frightful chic.
By Grant Scobie
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Stephanie M. Rizio & Ahmed Skali (2020). How Often do Dictators have Positive Economic Effects? Global Evidence 1858-2010, The Leadership Quarterly, 31(3), June 2020.