Autocratization and Political Violence: Investigating a Complex Relationship

Abstract

Recent years have seen both rising autocratization and an upsurge in violent conflict, political violence, and violent mass protests worldwide. These parallel developments raise pressing questions about the relationship between autocratization and political violence, which has received little academic attention so far. This panel strives to gain insights into the complex relationship between autocratization and political violence. It examines how autocratization may generate, shape, and channel violent conflict and political violence more broadly, looking at specific mechanisms, pathways, and actors, across different national contexts. It seeks to understand the conditions under which autocratization sparks political violence and how it affects existing conflict dynamics. It also examines the reverse direction of the relationship, investigating how and under what conditions political violence may initiate or reinforce autocratization trends. The panel takes a broad perspective on political violence, bringing together scholarship on violent conflict and civil war, electoral violence, and terrorism. By examining different mechanisms and actors, drawing on research from different world regions and using both quantitative and qualitative methods, it provides a multifaceted picture of the relationship between autocratization and political violence. The first two papers investigate when and why autocratization sparks violent conflict. The first study argues that autocratization can increase the risk of civil conflict, either by provoking violent resistance or through strategic repression by leaders. Using global data from 1945–2023, it shows that this risk is highest under conditions such as economic downturns, deep societal cleavages, and certain modes of autocratization. The second paper investigates democratic breakdowns, employing new process-level data. It analyses both democratic breakdowns’ inherent propensity for violence and when civil conflicts may escalate under new autocratic regimes. The third paper adopts a subnational perspective, analysing how subnational undemocratic regimes use violence to influence political participation and electoral competition. Based on fine-grained electoral data at the municipal level in Colombia, it provides systematic insights into how electoral politics at the local level are shaped by targeted violence. The fourth paper shows how autocratization disrupts state–society relations and enables insurgent activity. Examining governance vacuums and extremism, it brings together comparative evidence from Mali, Burkina Faso and Mozambique, combining spatial event data with qualitative conflict mapping and an analysis of state counterterrorism policy and discourse. The fifth paper explores how and under what conditions terrorism drives autocratization, using Bangladesh and Indonesia as qualitative case studies. It contributes to the nascent literature on the terrorism-autocratization-nexus by pointing to role of interacting influences and highlighting the political use of terrorism for repression purposes. Together, these five studies advance the research on the relationship between autocratization, political violence, and violent conflict by integrating macro- and micro-level perspectives, examining both top-down and bottom-up processes, and highlighting the role of diverse mechanisms, contexts, and actors.

Title	Details
When Autocratisation Turns Violent: Conditions and Mechanisms	View Paper Details
Modes of Democratic Breakdown and Violent Conflict	View Paper Details
Violence Before the Vote: Structuring Electoral Competition in Colombia	View Paper Details
The Autocratization Ecosystem: Governance Vacuums and Extremism in Fragile States in Africa	View Paper Details
Terrorism and Autocratization: Comparing Bangladesh and Indonesia.	View Paper Details