by: Josef Woldense
| Power-sharing is a double-edged sword in autocracies. At first, it creates stability by enticing elites to join the ruling coalition. Over time, however, it has the potential to tip the balance-of-power towards the elites and thereby leave incumbents more vulnerable to internal challenges. Our paper examines this lifecycle of power-sharing in the context of the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), the one-party regime whose reign spanned for 27 years. By giving its constituent parties autonomy in choosing their own central committees at the regional level, the EPRDF secured buy-in into the coalition from local elites across the country. Yet, this same mechanism also allowed the ERPDF’s once-junior parties to acquire accumulated leadership experience and eventually challenge the dominant member, the TPLF. We corroborate this institutional account with our original dataset of over 600 individuals elected across 24 party congresses of EPRDF’s four constituent parties. |
Authoritarian Political Systems Group 