Building a Scapegoat or Building Popularity? Autocrats, Blame Avoidance, and COVID-19 in the Arab World (With Renu Singh).
Do autocrats prioritize blame avoidance or credit claiming as they structure decision-making processes in their regimes? We argue that most autocrats have strong incentives to avoid blame by delegating policy decisions, since their need to prevent mass uprisings rather than win free elections increases the importance of evading anger relative to building support. However, autocrats facing internal elite threats or mass mobilizations are more likely to assert control over decision-making in an attempt to claim credit effectively and build their popularity. We analyze the COVID-19 response in four Arab countries to evaluate our argument. In Egypt, Jordan, and Morocco, autocrats delegated public health decisions to their cabinets, consistent with prioritization of blame avoidance. Only in Algeria, where the autocrat had a tenuous grip on power, did he assert control over the pandemic response. The paper sheds light on the politics of blame and policymaking in authoritarian regimes.