Legacies of an authoritarian past have enduring effects on voters’ attitudes and behaviors. I argue that authoritarian nostalgia is an important source of group sentiment and related behavior in post-authoritarian democracies. Voters with nostalgic sentiment construct heightened social identity connected to the past, exhibit strong group sentiment based on historical perception, and express attachment towards authoritarian successors.
The rise of China has attracted hopes and fears across its economic partners, but the popular responses to China’s economic expansion have accompanied a rise in anti-China sentiment among citizens. This study investigates how existing ethnic conflicts may further stimulate such anti-China sentiments in response to China’s economic expansion. We explore these dynamics by looking at the subnational variation in anti-China protests in a multi-ethnic democracy, Indonesia.
Why do voters elect authoritarian successors in some post-authoritarian countries but not in others? And what explains the variation in electoral success of nostalgic rhetoric across countries? This paper answers with a focus on how dictators consolidated symbolic power through nationalism, introducing a political psychological perspective in addition to the conventional focus on political economy.
Political nostalgia has been associated more closely with conservative ideologies but voter behavior from “Obama nostalgia” in the US and nostalgia for former president Roh Moo-hyun in South Korea may suggest that it may arise in any partisan hearts and minds. This begs the following questions: are liberals and conservatives equally nostalgic for a political past?