Week 01

Authoritarianism and the Problem of Disinformation

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Required Reading

ARTICLE

A Third Wave of Autocratization Is Here: What Is New About It?

Anna Lührmann and Staffan I. Lindberg

Democratization (2019)

ARTICLE

Disinformation and Regime Survival

Yuko Sato and Felix Wiebrecht

Political Research Quarterly (2024)

BOOK

Franco: The Biography of the Myth

Antonio Cazorla Sánchez

Routledge (2013)

Reading guidance: Read the Introduction only.

Further Reading

Defining Authoritarianism

Anna Lührmann, Marcus Tannenberg and Staffan I. Lindberg
“Regimes of the World (RoW): Opening New Avenues for the Comparative Study of Political Regimes”
Politics and Governance (2018)

Natasha M. Ezrow and Erica Frantz
Dictators and Dictatorships: Understanding Authoritarian Regimes and Their Leaders
Bloomsbury/Continuum (2011)
Reading guidance: Chapter 1, “Authoritarian Politics: Typologies.”

Jennifer Gandhi
Political Institutions under Dictatorship
Cambridge University Press (2008)
Reading guidance: Chapter 1, “The World of Dictatorial Institutions.”

The State of the World

Vanessa A. Boese, Martin Lundstedt, Kelly Morrison, Yuko Sato and Staffan I. Lindberg
“State of the World 2021: Autocratization Changing Its Nature?”
Democratization (2022)

W. Lance Bennett and Steven Livingston
“The Disinformation Order: Disruptive Communication and the Decline of Democratic Institutions”
European Journal of Communication (2018)

What Do We Know About Propaganda?

Bryn Rosenfeld and Jeremy Wallace
“Information Politics and Propaganda in Authoritarian Societies”
Annual Review of Political Science (2024)

Alexander Bor
“Viktor Orbán’s Election Loss Shows the Limits of His Propaganda Machine”
The Conversation (2026)

Public Support for Authoritarianism

Johannes Gerschewski
“The Three Pillars of Stability: Legitimation, Repression, and Co-optation in Autocratic Regimes”
Democratization (2013)

Anja Neundorf, Aykut Ozturk, Ksenia Northmore-Ball, Katerina Tertytchnaya and Johannes Gerschewski
“A Loyal Base: Support for Authoritarian Regimes in Times of Crisis”
Comparative Political Studies (2025)

Andrew J. Nathan
“The Puzzle of Authoritarian Legitimacy”
Journal of Democracy (2020)

Anja Neundorf and Grigore Pop-Eleches
“Dictators and Their Subjects: Authoritarian Attitudinal Effects and Legacies”
Comparative Political Studies (2020)

Lily L. Tsai
When People Want Punishment: Retributive Justice and the Puzzle of Authoritarian Popularity
Cambridge University Press (2021)
Reading guidance: Chapter 1, “The Puzzle of Authoritarian Popularity.”

Alexander Dukalskis and Johannes Gerschewski
“What Autocracies Say (and What Citizens Hear): Proposing Four Mechanisms of Autocratic Legitimation”
Contemporary Politics (2017)

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