Volume 58, Number 3, April 2026

Autocracies have increasingly begun to clothe themselves in the guise of hybrid, semi-official institutions that exhibit a degree of autonomy from the state, such as Government-Organized NGOs (GONGOs), “zombie” election observers, regime-run think tanks, astroturfing, or semi-official state-mobilized movements (SMMs). Existing literature has analyzed hybrid institutions as products of their functions. Instead, by employing a historical-institutional analysis of the evolution of Jordanian youth GONGOs, I demonstrate that institutional hybridity often arises from institutional contradictions, particularly between the path dependence (vested interests, inertia, and inflexibility) of existing institutions and shifting regime objectives, which drive autocrats to establish parallel hybrid institutions to perform the job existing institutions cannot. These findings bridge scholarship on historical institutionalism and authoritarian institutions by emphasizing the centrality of contradictions in institutional change.

Despite the predominance of informality in Russian state-business relations (SBRs), regional administrations have established diverse institutionalized forms of cooperation with business actors. These include socio-economic development agreements, public-private partnerships, and consultation mechanisms. Utilizing fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), this study systematically examines SBRs across all of Russia’s federal subjects, identifying varying degrees of institutionalization. The findings reveal that strongly institutionalized SBRs, found in fifty-nine out of eighty-three regions, result from four distinct configurations: a monopolistic economy, hegemonic authoritarian politics, personalist politics, and competitive authoritarian politics. The analysis demonstrates that institutionalized SBRs are beneficial for both business and state actors. It offers valuable insights into the rationale behind the formation of formal cooperation between state and businesses, thereby addressing key questions in comparative research on authoritarianism.

Labor unrest has become a salient feature of contentious politics around the globe. Yet, scholars disagree over the determinants of labor’s rise against the ruling elite in non-democracies. This article argues that emotional contagion explains a short-term spike in labor mobilization. Drawing on empirical evidence from Belarus, one of the most repressive political regimes in contemporary Europe, the study provides support for the argument. Utilizing original data from in-depth interviews with labor activists and industrial workers, empirical analysis demonstrates that a shared sense of outrage over the scale of police violence, along with the magnitude of electoral malpractices and the government’s neglect of citizens’ needs during a public health crisis, was a major catalyst for labor mobilization in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election.

Studies have discussed long-term effects of state-led violence on victims’ political attitudes and behaviors, but less is known about its impacts on those who sided with the perpetrators. We develop a theory of authoritarian indoctrination and cognitive dissonance that explains variation in outgroup intolerance among the majority group, focusing on the ethnic violence against Indonesia’s ethnic Chinese minority. Drawing upon unique survey data, we find that proximity to anti-Chinese violence in 1996–1999 correlates with elevated outgroup animosity today, particularly among individuals who grew up during the autocratic era. We further demonstrate that such bias extends to political behavior, leading to support for right-wing politicians instigating outgroup prejudice. Findings highlight historical legacies of authoritarian-led ethnic violence as a source of political intolerance.

For a long time, qualitative scholars found it hard not to talk about KKV. Designing Social Inquiry and its authors Gary (K)ing, Robert (K)eohane, and Sidney (V)erba galvanized an earlier generation of qualitative methodologists to write a number of important rejoinders contesting the meanings of terms and defending the very use of these methods. The authors of Doing Good Qualitative Research, Qualitative Literacy, and Integrated Inferences represent a new generation, one that has eschewed the shopworn debates of the past and is interested solely in developing and improving qualitative methods. These books constitute part of a larger and ongoing qualitative metamorphosis: the emergence of a new qualitative methodology that is more confident, inclusive, and one that is no longer willing to play by quantitative rules.