Abstract
This paper qualitatively revisits the thesis that rentier regimes can draw on their non-tax revenues to buy political legitimacy and stability. Exploring the material/moral interplay in Mideast rentier politics, I show why and how rents may provide for provisional, but not sustainable, stability for authoritarian rentier regimes. I propose distinguishing between negative and positive political legitimacy, the former being about 'what is legitimate' (liberty vs security), and the latter about 'who is the legitimator' (divine/hereditary right vs popular sovereignty). Sustainable stability is predicated on having both legitimacies. Rentier regimes, however, often draw exclusively on negative political legitimacy. These regimes can use rents to buy time - through coercion and expediency - contriving an imagery of a lusty Leviathan. But due to the diversity of rents and the temporal shifts in their revenues, this social contract is materially contingent and morally frail - rendering authoritarian rentier regimes, not least in the Middle East, more mortal than they, and many observers, are ready to admit.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 55-79 |
Number of pages | 25 |
Journal | Journal of International Relations and Development |
Volume | 20 |
Issue number | 1 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 1 Jan 2017 |
Keywords
- Middle East
- authoritarian stability
- political legitimacy
- rentier state theory
All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes
- Geography, Planning and Development
- Development
- Political Science and International Relations