In his book Power and Prosperity, the economist Mancur Olson theorized that a country is better off under a dictator who maintains power for a long period, such as Mobutu, than under a short-term, unstable dictatorship
Olson maintained that, while both are very undesirable forms of government, the former is less disruptive to the economy than the latter.Discuss why this assertion may or may not be true.
Olson contrasted the incentives of long-term tyrants, whom he terms "stationary bandits," with those of "roving bandits"—tyrants whose period in power is limited and unstable.Dictators whose hold on power is tenuous and likely to be short-lived have an incentive to plunder as much as possible from the economy as quickly as possible, leaving the country in economic chaos and destitution.
Tyrants who manage to maintain power for an extended period often refrain fromexploiting their population to the extent that they could.Although corrupt and certainly willing to exploit his people for personal gain, a dictator like Mobutu would have been less inclined to extract so much from the economy that it could no longer function.If the economy ceased to function, Mobutu'sability to enrich himself and his cronies would have thus come to an end, and future gains would not have been possible.Hence, as economically dysfunctional as dictatorships usually are, they are less so than the anarchy that normally accompanies brief, unstable regimes.
A-head: CONFLICT OF INTEREST AND POLITICAL ECONOMY
Concept: Monarchy, Dictatorship and Democracy
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