On dictatorships

This dissertation consists of three essays on dictatorships. The first two study the economic impact of power struggles in dictatorships. They focus on one mechanism used by dictators to remain in power, shuffling, where delegates have a short and uncertain tenure in any assignment. In these models, there is a ruler, a delegate and a population. The ruler and the delegate have a 'type', characterizing their ability as a ruler. The population can mount an insurrection, replacing the ruler with the delegate. The type of the ruler is known, while the type of the delegate is unknown to the other players. In Chapter 1, I assume that the delegate does not know his type, but can reveal it through an investment decision. I then show that shuffling is useful politically, even though it produces an economic cost, in that it reduces the delegate's incentive to invest, which prevents information about his type from being revealed. I also show that the ability to shuffle has some economic benefits, in that it assures the ruler that he can eliminate growing political threats, which induces him to encourage some investment.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Economics.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2007

Author dc:creator

• Debs, Alexandre

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Daron Acemoglu and James M. Snyder, Jr.

• Economics.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/39723

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/39723