Et Tu, Brute? Wealth Inequality and the Political Economy of Authoritarian Replacement

What motivates elite factions to seek to replace an authoritarian incumbent? In this article, I provide a political economy theory of authoritarian replacement. I argue that high wealth inequality fosters authoritarian replacement, but that the effect is conditional on overall wealth being low. At low wealth, elite factions have an incentive to control the state to appropriate income. As wealth grows, elites shift their focus toward securing their wealth and thus prioritize finding credible commitments and stability within authoritarianism. I test these hypotheses using data from 1960 to 2008 and employ multistate survival analysis. A case study of Trujillo’s rise in the Dominican Republic illustrates the mechanisms of the theory. The evidence supports the main theoretical expectation that replacement is more likely when the level of wealth is low but wealth inequality is high.