Many would-be autocrats, particularly in the Western world, paint their opponents as elite and out-of-touch liberals, juxtaposed with everyday conservative people. In this way, autocrats can justify attacking their opponents—often with broad public approval—if they cast their opponents as enemies of the people.

Wesleyan University

Autocrats exacerbate long-existing social divides (such as racial or ethnic divides, political divides, etc.) to destabilize a country’s political system and garner popular support.

How Autocrats Utilize and Exacerbate Social Divides

Haggard, S. & Kaufman, R. R. (2021). Backsliding: Democratic Regress in the Contemporary World. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Haggard & Kaufman (2021)

Since its independence in the 1990s, Northern Macedonia has long endured ethnic conflicts between the ethnic Macedonians and the minority ethnic Albanians. Prime Minister Gruevski utilized a pro-Macedonian nationalist narrative to consolidate support and rise to power, exacerbating ethnic divides in the process.

Autocrats and Racial/Ethnic Divides: Northern Macedonia

Bolivia has a large indigenous population that is significantly poorer than the white and mestizo populations of the country. Evo Morales galvanized indigenous support through ethnic and socioeconomic populism to rise to the presidency, promising to improve the quality of life for indigenous people. Morales used his resulting popularity to justify centralizing power and defying term limits to extend his rule. 

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