Despite its wide usage in explaining some nontrivial dynamics in nondemocratic systems, preference falsification remains an empirical myth for students of authoritarian politics. We provide to our knowledge the first quantitative study of preference falsification in an authoritarian setting...

Authoritarian regimes face pervasive information problems, not only between state and society but also inside of their own hierarchies. How do authoritarian leaders address internal information issues? We argue that authoritarian information systems contain both formal and informal channels and...

How does politics affect the distribution of public resources in authoritarian regimes? We argue that in systems where informal patronage networks coexist with strong career incentives, aspiring politicians want to use public resources to aid the careers of their clients, but are constrained by...

Leadership is a crucial aspect of politics, but systematic evidence on how politicians lead and the consequences of their leadership styles remains scant. This study sheds light on these issues by analyzing a unique dataset of internal evaluation remarks for top provincial politicians in China....

Popular support is essential to the long-term survival of all political systems, yet the question of what affects citizens' faith in their political institutions remains debated. We construct a new measure of institutional trust for 130 countries between 1990 and 2017 and use it to evaluate two...

Patron-client networks are widely found in governments of transitional societies and are often seen as an impediment to effective governance. This article advances an alternative view that emphasizes their enabling effects. I argue that patron-client relations can be used to improve government...

Internet-based platforms are increasingly being used by governments around the world to facilitate public engagement with citizens. However, it remains an open question whether participation through these platforms can actually enable citizens to influence policies. We address this question by...