Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP6014
Authors: Paul Gregory; Philipp Schröder; Konstantin Sonin
Abstract: This paper sheds light on dictatorial behavior as exemplified by the mass terror campaigns of Stalin. Dictatorships - unlike democracies where politicians choose platforms in view of voter preferences - may attempt to trim their constituency and thus ensure regime survival via the large scale elimination of citizens. We formalize this idea in a simple model and use it to examine Stalin?s three large scale terror campaigns with data from the NKVD state archives that are accessible after more than 60 years of secrecy. Our model traces the stylized facts of Stalin?s terror and identifies parameters such as the ability to correctly identify regime enemies, the actual or perceived number of enemies in the population, and how secure the dictator's power base is, as crucial for the patterns and scale of repression.
Keywords: dictatorial systems; NKVD; Soviet state and party archives; Stalinism
JEL Codes: N44; P00; P26
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| Higher perceived threat levels (H56) | Increased repression (Y50) |
| Perceived share of enemies exceeds a critical threshold (D74) | Mass repression (P26) |
| Lower quality information (L15) | Higher rates of wrongful executions and imprisonments (K14) |
| Risk of revolt is high (D74) | Acceptance of elimination of passive citizens (F22) |