%0 Generic
%A Bader, Julia
%D 2011
%F heidok:13438
%K autokratisches Überleben , Selektoratautocracy , China , autocratic survival , international cooperation , Burma , Cambodia , Mongolia , selectorate
%R 10.11588/heidok.00013438
%T China, autocratic cooperation and autocratic survival
%U https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/13438/
%X This thesis examines whether China, as an emerging autocratic power, is a force of autocratic stability in the world. By combining expertise accumulated in the field of area studies with a comparative research design that is common in the field of international politics, this thesis contributes to two scientific debates: First, it adds to the discussion on the external factors of regime type. Second, it explores the effects and attempts to quantify the impact of China's rise on other governments.  Against the background of a political economy argument, I argue that autocratic powers should prefer other states to become autocratic too. Reliant on the distribution of private goods to bind domestic supporters, autocratic leaders benefit from other similar small winning coalition governments, because it is easier to extract resources from other small winning coalitions. These resources can then be distributed at home. Given these considerations, I suppose that cooperation between autocrats is a cause of autocratic longevity rather than a mere consequence of regime similarity as is usually assumed.  In order to test my hypotheses, I construct an innovative data set on China's foreign relations. My regression results suggest that the Chinese government prefers cooperation with autocratic small coalition governments and that trade with China improves the likelihood of survival for autocratic leaders. Furthermore, the argument is tested by the means of three comparative case studies. In order to do so, China’s success is compared in realizing three Chinese foreign policy interests in three Asian developing countries with a variety of political systems. The case studies compare whether or not Myanmar, Cambodia and Mongolia adhered to the ‘one-China’ policy, to what extent they provided access to natural resources to Chinese companies and how they positioned themselves with regard to China’s geo-political interests. Suggesting that more autocratic countries showed greater compliance, the results support the theoretical argument.