Food and Power : Agricultural Policy Under Democracy and Dictatorship

Agricultural policy is a key determinant of development outcomes and has large effects on global trade flows. However, scholars cannot fully explain variation in these policies because they have not examined how they are made under authoritarian governments. I argue that agricultural policy under autocracy is a function of the power of producers and consumers to organize collectively and threaten the stability of authoritarian regimes. Higher levels of agricultural support occur under autocracy when landholding inequality creates a smaller, richer and better-organized group of farmers. When food consumers are concentrated in urban areas and not divided by income inequality, they pose a greater threat of unrest. This leads autocracies to provide lower levels of agricultural support and lower food prices