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Konkvistador comments on Orwell and fictional evidence for dictatorship stability - Less Wrong Discussion
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Comments (79)
Incentives and time preferences. Ceteris Paribus a monarch with children he cares about has lower time preferences, since he has good reason to believe they will inherit ownership of the country. The second important difference is that dictators usually rule in the name of the people, deriving legitimacy from an abstracted will of the people. They are demotist.
Monarchies not so much. Kings derive legitimacy from the will of God(s), sometimes claiming to being such. An alternative basis for legitimacy that is often present is that this society sees the idea privately instead of publicly owned government as acceptable. As long as say a Queen doesn't use the state to violate the property of her subjects too much, they have an incentive to maintain the respect for private property norm that legitimizes the monarch as well as their own wealth. The state as a family business is a de facto and rather stable reality in many nominal democracies as well.
Edit: RolfAndreassen's comment is quite good too.
The legitimacy issue is perhaps more important. As long as some people with influence accept the theory that gives legitimacy to the rightful heir, the monarch has a built-in advantage over any challenger. That may be quite small, but there is a multiplier effect, because those who value stability and peace will also support the monarch over a rival in order to preserve that stabilising factor. That is quite explicit in some writing from the period (nothing to hand, sorry) - "We must support the King because the existence of a rightful king is what saves us from perpetual civil war"
Monarchies tend to break down when that advantage is lost, either due to unclear succession, or an obviously incompetent heir. Civil war due to these situations was common enough that the stability argument was seen as realistic and concrete.
What practical difference does that make with a strong, tyrannical dictator? Whatever the official theory, the people can't depose him and choose a different ruler.
The difference it makes is with non-strong dictators.