Authoritarian Elections: State of Literature and Research Problems

Abstract

The article provides an overview of current research on elections in authoritarian political regimes. For this purpose, a number of significant papers on this issue have been selected, published in peer-reviewed academic journals with a high impact-factor. The assessment of the significance of the works was made primarily on the basis of their citation indicators according to Scopus and Google Scholar. It is stated that despite the rapid growth in the number of works on authoritarian elections over the past two decades, it is still far from building a comprehensive theory in this area. The review focuses on the question of how elections affect the survival of authoritarian regimes. In this regard, conflicting positions are presented in the literature. On the one hand, elections are seen as instruments for stabilization of authoritarian rule, on the other hand — as sources of instability, and on the third — as levers of democratization.