The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics

by Bruce Bueno de Mesquita

dictators, dependent on a few cronies, are in a far better position to stay in office for decades, often dying in their sleep, than are democrats.

States don’t have interests. People do.

why leaders can spend a fortune on the military and yet have a weak and almost useless army when it comes to the national defense.

no leader whatsoever can govern alone.

They would be loyal to him only so long as being so was more profitable for them than supporting someone else.

Those who were privileged to be in his winning coalition knew that under the enlarged pool of candidates for such positions, any one of them could easily be replaced if they did not prove sufficiently trustworthy and loyal to the king.

In fact, one might almost conclude that Oxford is a breeding ground for authoritarians. It certainly is the alma mater of many, including Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, the Bhutto family of Pakistan, kings of Jordan, Bhutan, Malaysia, and even little Tonga.

Indeed, it so happens that even in many autocracies with reportedly good health-care systems, infant mortality is high. This may be because helping little children does not particularly help leaders survive in power.

Earthquakes and tsunamis are hard to foresee. But their aftermath is not.

“Power tends to corrupt, absolute power corrupts absolutely,” holds generally true—however it doesn’t quite capture the causality. The causal ties run both ways: power leads to corruption and corruption leads to power.

As coalition size increases, corruption becomes a thing of the past.

If politicians want to end massive bonuses for bankers then they need to pass legislation that fosters the restructuring of corporate government, so that chief executive officers and board chairs really depend on the will of their millions of shareholders (and not on a handful of government regulators).

To take just one prominent example, the United States gave Pakistan $6.6 billion in military aid to combat the Taliban between 2001 and 2008. Only $500 million is estimated to have ever reached the army.

The fact is, aid does a little bit of good in the world and vastly more harm.

Aid agreements are notorious for being tied to conditions that help the donor. This means that the agreement often specifies how, and more importantly where, the money is spent. For instance, Germany might give a recipient money, but only if they use it to buy German tractors. This might seem an inefficient way to reward tractor manufacturers. However, international trade laws often forbid direct subsidies. Further, tied aid can bring future business, such as spare parts and service.

The record is unambiguous: foreign assistance has proven ineffective at alleviating poverty and promoting economic growth.

The United States’s goals were to build stalwart states aligned against communism. To achieve these ends, the United States needed an economically strong Europe. States that were willing to combat communism and follow US-dictated economic plans got aid; those not willing to do so, didn’t.

The historical record shows that aid has largely failed to lift nations out of poverty. It is perhaps ironic that while aid affords the resources to alleviate poverty and promote economic growth, it creates the political incentives to do just the opposite. As Edward Walker, US ambassador to Egypt (1994–1998) succinctly put it, “Aid offers an easy way out for Egypt to avoid reform.”

Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have proven that they can effectively deliver basic health care and primary education. Yet harking back to our discussion of public goods provided by small-coalition regimes, we can’t help but notice that these benefits are precisely the kinds of public policy programs that even the most autocratic leaders want to initiate. NGOs are less successful at providing advanced education. Autocratic leaders in recipient states don’t want people to be taught how to think independently enough that they could organize opposition to the government.

The reality is that in most cases democracies don’t want to create democracies. In 1939, US president Franklin Delano Roosevelt famously remarked about Anastasio Somoza García, a brutal Nicaraguan dictator, that, “He’s a son of a bitch, but at least he’s our son of a bitch.” And herein lies the rub. Dictators are cheap to buy.

Buying democrats is much more expensive. Almost every US president has argued that he wants to foster democracy in the world. However, the same US presidents have had no problem undermining democratic, or democratizing, regimes when the people of those nations elect leaders to implement policies US voters don’t like.

For a price (totalling billions by the time he fell out of power thirty-two years after his ascent) Mobutu was willing to back US policy. Democratically elected Lumumba was not and that meant he had to go.

However, as long as we the people want cheap gasoline and an abundance of markets in which to dump agricultural products, and we want that more than we want to see genuine development in poor countries, then our leaders are going to carry out our wishes. If they don’t, why they’ll be replaced with someone who will. That’s what democracy is all about—government of, by, and for the people at home.

Many revolutions end up simply replacing one autocracy with another. On some occasions the successor regime can actually be worse than its predecessor.

Revolutionary movements may seem spontaneous but we really need to understand that they arise when enough citizens believe they have a realistic chance of success. That is why successful autocrats make rebellion truly unattractive.

Lyndon Johnson, for instance, chose not to seek reelection in the face of deep dissatisfaction with his Vietnam War policies.

While completely counterintuitive, military men who lead juntas, and other forms of autocratic leaders, are much worse at fighting wars than their civilian counterparts who lead democratic governments. That’s why it’s so important for us to unpack the contrasting advice different leaders receive about how to and when to fight.

Democracies don’t fight with each other, true. Rather, big democracies pick on little opponents whether they are democratic or not, with the expectation that they won’t fight back or won’t put up much of a fight. Indeed, that could very well be viewed as a straightforward explanation of the history of democracies engaged in imperial and colonial expansion against weak adversaries with little hope of defending themselves. This democratic propensity to pick on weak foes is nothing new. Looking at all wars for nearly the past two centuries, we know that about 93 percent of wars started by democratic states are won by them. In contrast, only about 60 percent of wars started by nondemocracies are won by them.17

Democrats might say they care about the rights of people overseas to determine their own future, and they might actually care too, but if they want to keep their jobs they will deliver the policies that their people want. Earlier we examined how democrats use foreign aid to buy policy. If that fails, or gets too expensive, then force is always an option. Military victory allows the victors to impose policy.

US foreign policy is awash with examples where the United States overtly or covertly undermines the development of democracy because it promoted the policies counter to US interests.

The big problem with democratizing overseas continues to lie with we, the people. In most cases we seem to prefer that foreign nations do what we want, not what they want. However, if our interests align then successful democratization is more likely.

A man always has two reasons for doing anything: a good reason and the real reason. —J. P. MORGAN

Blind fools don’t often get to rule countries or companies. Pretty much any leader worth his salt can see the dangers he faces when economic circumstances leave him bereft of funds to buy loyalty.

Win the right combination of states—rather than the most voters—and you can be president.