It is generally accepted that in established democracies, citizens' perception of political corruption is corrosive of support for the government and even the regime. What is less clear is that perceived corruption has the same effect in authoritarian regimes, where democratic norms of official behavior are less relevant and there has been scant empirical study of effects of perceived corruption on satisfaction with government and its officials. Using data from a 2008 nationwide survey in China, this study explores the relationship of perceived corruption to government satisfaction in an established totalitarian regime. With nearly two thirds of respondents considering corruption a "serious problem," blame appears to be assigned more to local governments than to the central level and regime. The paper concludes with speculation that features of authoritarianism and/or of totalitarianism shield central government more than local officials from criticism when negative implications of perceived corruption come into play.

Corruption is rampant in many authoritarian regimes, leading most observers to assume that autocrats have little incentive or ability to curb government wrongdoing. Corruption Control in Authoritarian Regimes shows that meaningful anti-corruption efforts by nondemocracies are more common and more often successful than is typically understood. Drawing on wide-ranging analysis of authoritarian anti-corruption efforts globally and in-depth case studies of key countries such as China, South Korea and Taiwan over time, Dr. Carothers constructs an original theory of authoritarian corruption control. He disputes views that hold democratic or quasi-democratic institutions as necessary for political governance successes and argues that corruption control in authoritarian regimes often depends on a powerful autocratic reformer having a free hand to enact and enforce measures curbing government wrongdoing. This book advances our understanding of authoritarian governance and durability while also opening up new avenues of inquiry about the politics of corruption control in East Asia and beyond.

"This volume compares the most powerful authoritarian states in global politics today: Russia and China. For all their power and money, both regimes have faced difficult tradeoffs in seeking both political stability and reliable information about society while confronting the West and its international influence. They have also made different choices: Russia today is a competitive authoritarian regime, while China is a non-competitive authoritarian regime. Desite the different paths taken after the tumultuous events of 1989, both regimes have returned to a more personalized form of authoritarian rule. By placing China and Russia side-by-side, this volume examines regime-society relations and produces new insights, including what strategies their rulers have used to stay in power while forging political stability and gathering information; how societal groups have resisted, complied, or responded to these strategies; and what costs and benefits, anticipated and unexpected, have accompanied the bargains political leaders and their societies have struck. The essays in this volume change the way we understand authoritarian politics and expand the terrain of how we analyze regime-society relations in authoritarian states. On the societal side, this book looks not just at society as a whole, but also the more specific roles of public opinion, labor politics, political socialization, political protests, media politics, environmental movements, and non-governmental organizations. On the regime side, this study is distinctive in examining not just domestic threats and the general strategies rulers deploy in order to manage them, but also international threats and the rationale behind and impact of new laws and new policies, both domestic and international"--

This book analyzes why some dictators find it in their self-interest to curb corruption.

This volume explores the foundations of trust, and whether social and political trust have common roots. Contributions by noted scholars examine how we measure trust, the cultural and social psychological roots of trust, the foundations of political trust, and how trust concerns the law, the economy, elections, international relations, corruption, and cooperation, among myriad societal factors. The rich assortment of essays on these themes addresses questions such as: How does national identity shape trust, and how does trust form in developing countries and in new democracies? Are minority groups less trusting than the dominant group in a society? Do immigrants adapt to the trust levels of their host countries? Does group interaction build trust? Does the welfare state promote trust and, in turn, does trust lead to greater well-being and to better health outcomes? The Oxford Handbook of Social and Political Trust considers these and other questions of critical importance for current scholarly investigations of trust.

While authoritarian regimes lack popular consent by definition, many of them are among the countries with the highest levels of popular support. In this four-paper dissertation, I examine various overlooked strategies that are commonly used by authoritarian regimes to shape citizens' perceptions of their government and to influence the public's opinion towards the regime. In the first paper on anti-corruption campaigns, I show that popular support for the government depends in a conditional way on the perceived effectiveness AND motivation of the anti-corruption campaigns. Due to possible preference falsification, anti-corruption campaigns that are perceived as targeting political rivals increase reported support for the government but not necessarily actual support. In the second paper, I separate the actual levels of support and reported levels of support for the government using a list experiment. I find that respondents who are coopted by the government have higher actual support for the regime and are less likely to inflate their support in public while respondents who experienced repression in the past have low actual support for the regime but are more likely to report inflated support for the regime. In the third paper, I examine a new form of propaganda, native political advertising, in which political actors buy space in independent media outlets to publish advertisements that are camouflaged as standard news stories. I provide the first theoretical framework and empirical evidence on how governments can use native political advertising to influence public opinion both domestically and abroad. In the fourth paper, I examine the strategic use of populism in authoritarian regimes and challenge the conventional wisdom that populism is rare under authoritarian rule. I also provide the first comparative and generalizable way of measuring populist rhetoric using text data.

This book, by Sonja Zmerli and Marc Hooghe, presents cutting-edge empirical research on political trust as a relational concept. From a European comparative perspective it addresses a broad range of contested issues. Can political trust be conceived as a one-dimensional concept and to what extent do international population surveys warrant the culturally equivalent measurement of political trust across European societies? Is there indeed an observable general trend of declining levels of political trust? What are the individual, societal and political prerequisites of political trust and how do they translate into trustful attitudes? Why do so many Eastern European citizens still distrust their political institutions and how does the implementation of welfare state policies both enhance and benefit from political trust? The comprehensive empirical evidence presented in this book by leading scholars provides valuable insights into the relational aspects of political trust and will certainly stimulate future research. This book features: a state-of-the-art European perspective on political trust; an analysis of the most recent trends with regard to the development of political trust; a comparison of traditional and emerging democracies in Europe; the consequences of political trust on political stability and the welfare state; a counterbalance to the gloomy American picture of declining political trust levels.