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Autocratization and inequalities between ethnic groups in the contemporary world

par Panzano, Guido
Président du jury Pilet, Jean-Benoît
Promoteur Tomini, Luca
Publication Non publié, 2024-04-29

Thèse de doctorat

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Résumé :

This dissertation examines the interplay between economic, political, and social inequalities among ethnic groups and democratic decline, democratic breakdown, and various forms of autocratization. It is based on a series of original aggregations of existing data, both mass surveys and expert surveys, as well as documentation from international organizations. Using a combination of quantitative (time-series cross-sectional regressions, survival analysis, and mediation/path analysis), medium-N comparative (Qualitative Comparative Analysis, QCA), and case-based techniques (document analysis and secondary literature), the dissertation aims to demonstrate a complex causal path. Its causal model is based on the politicization and polarization of ethnic boundaries due to the increase in economic, political, and social inequalities between ethnic groups. It shows that such inequalities can lead to a higher propensity to de-democratize, initiate an autocratization process, and conclude it more rapidly with a regime change to autocracy (e.g., democratic breakdown), especially when anti-pluralist parties lead the government, opposition actors are divided, and multiple dimensions of ethnic inequalities overlap. The dissertation also adds causal complexity by identifying how episodes of autocratization can, in turn, foster the ethnocratization of the political regime, i.e., the deterioration of relations between its constituent ethnic groups. In this way, the mechanisms that led to ethnic inequalities in the first phase can contribute to restarting (or exacerbating) the process of autocratization.In what follows, the dissertation first presents a unique theoretical framework -- and its overall research design (Chapters 1 and 2) -- that is then broken down into multiple and smaller expectations that are tested in its empirical chapters (Chapters 3 to 7). In general, it combines a neo-institutionalist and structuralist approach to examine the interplay between societal and political regime dynamics and evolution, with a historical and global analysis that includes in the model the role of agency, such as political parties at the head of government and opposition actors. In its conclusion, the dissertation will also reflect on how to disrupt the negative feedback effect or loop between the increase of inequalities between ethnic groups and autocratization, by promoting a more inclusive democracy for all.