Despite the fact that China has frequently been criticized for acting as a patron for autocratic regimes, research on autocratic longevity has not paid much attention to the rise of China. This paper seeks to address this gap of research. It discusses China´s foreign policy with regard to its dealings with autocratic regimes and quantitatively assesses whether China´s rise impacts on autocratic longevity in the post-Cold War era. In doing so it examines different forms of bilateral interaction between China and other autocracies. The preliminary results of several regression analyses suggest that the effect of most of these bilateral interactions with China is limited or even negligible. However, exports to China potentially increase the longevity of autocratic leaders.
