Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Strategic Balance Between The Public And Allies: A Theory Of Authoritarian Distribution In China, Dongshu Liu

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This project explores how authoritarian regimes can meet the demands of both the ruling coalition and the public from a perspective of distributional politics. This challenge is particularly severe since authoritarian regimes face increasing pressure to expand public goods and welfare. This project proposes a theory of authoritarian distribution that addresses this challenge in the case of China. First, autocrats adopted a differentiated strategy of distribution. They allocate universalistic benefits that target the large group of people to the public while distributing the particularistic benefits, which is exclusively for a small and specific group of people, to the regime allies. …