Unravelling the dynamics of authoritarian strategies : a comparative study of Suharto’s new order in Indonesia and Jammeh’s rule in the Gambia

Abstract

The dynamics of authoritarian power consolidation is receiving more attention today than it has ever been before as a result of rising authoritarianism and democratic backsliding. However, there exists an undertheorized and variations on autocrat’s decision calculus for prioritizing repression over co-optation, vice versa. Drawing from this, I make two assumptions that state: 1. Low resource endowment leads to high repression, and 2. High resource endowment leads to low repression and high co-optation. To understand this phenomenon, I compared Yahya Jammeh (1994–2016) in the Gambia (a low resource authoritarian regime) and Suharto (1966–1998) in Indonesia (a high resource authoritarian regime). I used the Gambian case (1994-2016) to explain the first assumption, and the second assumption is examined using the case of Indonesia (1965-1998). By observation, both regimes on the surface appear similar as both were military juntas in Muslimmajority countries. However, the literature shows that their authoritarian strategies and tactics varied in profoundly – Jammeh primarily imposed repression as strategy, whereas Suharto was inclined more towards co-optation. However, I do not argue that this explanation is exclusive, as it is context dependent. To examine this phenomenon, I drew data from government websites, international reports, journal articles, news outlets, and other online resources. Thus, this study intends to contribute to the understanding of autocrats’ decision-making strategyies.