The logic and consequences of personality cults in contemporary dictatorships (CULTS)

Dictatorships are once again on the rise worldwide with significant consequences for global security. In many authoritarian powers, we are also witnessing an alarming increase in the domestic veneration of the dictator. However, we still know very little about how so-called personality cults form and develop in autocracies, and what consequences they have for internal developments and foreign policy. Using new methodological tools, the CULTS project, which is headed by PI Jakob Tolstrup (Aarhus University) and co-PI Alexander Baturo (Dublin City University), offers the first systematic study of personality cults in modern dictatorships. We examine the dynamics and negative consequences of personality cults both at the micro level in Vladimir Putin's Russia and Xi Jinping's China, and at the macro level comparatively across all post-Cold War dictatorships. The CULTS project thus sheds light on one of the central – but often superficially treated in research – aspects of those dictatorships that seem to threaten the liberal world order and the position of democracy worldwide.