Authoritarian sponsorship of weak clients: the case of Saudi Arabia and Yemen

This paper aims at analyzing how specific features of nondemocratic clients may shape the behavior of authoritarian patrons. I depart from the assumption that international sponsors’ more general goal is to maintain or enhance their ability to influence political processes outside their borders in ways that are advantageous to their interests (Brownlee, 2017). Hence, in relations with friendly autocrats, external interventions aim at bolstering the stability of the regime rather than at a transfer of power. Yet, relations between nondemocratic states can be fuzzier than described above and foreign patrons may be induced to forge ties with different actors within the target state, since the regime can be little cohesive and the distribution of power between the state and sub/non-state actors can be liable to rapid shifts. My argument is that client states’ capacity influences the strategies adopted by authoritarian sponsors to pursue their foreign policy interests. Taking into consideration the degree of state capacity would contribute to a more exhaustive understanding of autocratic powers’ behavior, and explain apparently inconsistent strategies, like simultaneously supporting actors with conflicting interests and ideologies, or enabling the regime to face some domestic threats while working to empower some of its potential challengers. Moreover, particular vulnerabilities of client states can shape the means illiberal sponsors use to pursue their goals. As an example, low coercive capacity may induce the patron to adopt measures to prevent the onset – and potential spillover – of armed conflicts. To this purpose, it can provide military aid not only to the regime, but also to non-state actors who are asked to support the incumbents in responding to internal threats. Analogously, lack of administrative capacity may induce the patron to provide economic aid to local leaders who can serve as service providers. This way, the autocratic patron is able to increase the dependence – and the acquiescence, as a consequence – of different actors within the target state, ensuring that – in case of changes in power configurations – its interests are protected. In order to shed more light on these issues, I focus on the relations between Saudi Arabia and Yemen. I find that this case could be particularly illuminating, since the asymmetry of resources and geographic proximity between these two countries was expected to give rise to a classic hierarchical patron-client relation, in which, in return for security guarantees provided by the patron, the client gives the latter its allegiance (McKoy & Miller, 2012: 907). However, the vulnerability of the Yemeni state has produced a different relation, to wit a situation in which the authoritarian patron, in order to maintain its influence in the target state, has been induced to extend its patronage to a plethora of different actors who had a stake on regime survival or could rise to power in case of regime collapse.