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Coups And Conflict: The Paradox Of Coup-Proofing, Jonathan M. Powell
Coups And Conflict: The Paradox Of Coup-Proofing, Jonathan M. Powell
Theses and Dissertations--Political Science
This study develops a leader-centric theory of civil-military relations that expands upon three broad areas of research. Specifically, the study suggests that leaders will evaluate multiple threats to their political survival and will ultimately implement strategy that is most likely to keep them in power. While Downs (1957) has noted such a tendency in democracies, this study expands this rationale to authoritarian regimes by focusing on the primary means of authoritarian removal: the military coup. In contrast to the state-centric nature of traditional international relations theory, this dissertation finds that leaders frequently undermine the power of the state in order …