Will autocratic governments implement policies to satisfy the people’s demands in order to prevent large scale social unrest? This paper explores this question through quantitatively analysis of the political economy of public goods provision in Chinese provinces. I collected data on the...

The purpose of this paper is to explore the joint work of two mechanisms that might constrain autocratic rulers: the threat of a coup by the political elite and of a revolution by the citizens. Our results will help explain a well-established and crucial fact, that is, that autocracies are far...

Do citizens have a role in constraining the policies of autocratic governments? Usually political and economic literature models autocracy as if citizens have no role in constraining a leader's behavior, when in fact autocratic governments are afraid of potential citizen revolts. In this paper...