In recent decades, dictatorships based on mass repression have largely given way to a new model based on the manipulation of information. Instead of terrorizing citizens into submission, "informational autocrats" artificially boost their popularity by convincing the public they are competent. To...

How does international trade affect the popularity of government and leaders? Using data covering 118 countries and nearly 450,000 individuals, we show that attitudes towards globalisation depend on both individuals' skill levels and the skill intensity of the country's exports and imports. Our...

While some dictators survive through terror, others seem genuinely popular. In what we believe is the first global study of political approval in non-democracies, we use the Gallup World Poll's panel of more than 140 countries in 2006-16 to investigate the drivers of authoritarian leaders'...

How does international trade affect the popularity of governments and leaders? We provide the first large-scale, systematic evidence that the divide between skilled and unskilled workers worldwide is producing corresponding differences in the response of political preferences to trade shocks....

In recent decades, dictatorships based on mass repression have largely given way to a new model based on the manipulation of information. Instead of terrorizing citizens into submission, "informational autocrats" artificially boost their popularity by convincing the public they are competent. To...