John Chin
Biographic Data
| ID | 4371131 |
|---|---|
| NAME | John Chin |
| GIVEN NAMES | John |
| FAMILY NAME | Chin |
| SIGNATURE | CHIN J |
| AFFILIATIONS | Carnegie Mellon University |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5318-6062 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 11 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 116 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 11 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2003 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
Should the U.S. promote (illiberal) democracy in the Middle East
This article reviews Shadi Hamid’s book The Problem of Democracy: America, the Middle East, and the Rise and Fall of an Idea . It interrogates three key assumptions behind the author’s call for abandoning a “stability first” strategy for a “democracy first” strategy in the Middle East. These include the claim that (1) liberalism and democracy are diverging, (2) Arab dictatorships are brittle, and (3) there is a stark tradeoff between prioritizing…
Taiwan
Taiwan is not just a victim-in-waiting, damsel in distress, or pawn in a new Cold War. Taiwan stands as an exemplar: the world’s first “Chinese democracy” and a democratic David in the shadow of an autocratic Goliath. Taiwan’s success in deepening democracy and resisting Chinese sharp power may hold lessons on how to counter the rising global tide of authoritarianism. To elucidate these lessons, we review Taiwan’s democratic history and ongoing e…
African coups in the Covid-19 era
What explains the explosion of coup activity in Africa over the last few years? To answer this question, this article presents narrative summaries—a current history—of all eleven coups attempts in Africa between August 2020 and November 2022. We then discuss the most relevant causal explanations for the observed increase in coup frequency in Africa in this period. Though we find relatively little evidence of direct coup diffusion or democratic ba…
The Rush to Personalize
How do failed coups influence power personalization in dictatorships? While scholars have studied the mechanisms of personalism in dictatorships in detail, little attention has been paid to the timing and determinants of surges in personalism levels. In this article, we propose that personalism can evolve non-linearly, and show that large, quite rapid increases in personalization by dictators occur after a failed coup attempt. The logic is that f…
Personalization of Power and Mass Uprisings in Dictatorships
Most major nonviolent civil resistance campaigns target autocratic regimes. Yet, most dictators are toppled by their close supporters, not civilian protesters. Building on theories of strategic interactions between leaders, security agents, and protesters, we make three core claims: first, protesters are relatively less likely to mount a major nonviolent uprising against dictatorships with personalized security forces; secondly, personalized secu…
Reshaping the Threat Environment
Dictators shape regime structures to counter the threats they face. Personalization entails the progressive accumulation of power in the hands of the dictator to minimize internal threats from organized elites in the military and party. However, elites have incentives to resist the personalization to avoid being marginalized by personalist strongmen. We argue that as personalism increases, rival elites, less able to coordinate coup attempts, turn…
Activists Against Autocrats
Do transnational social movement organizations (TSMOs) promote the international diffusion of democracy? If so, how? Scholars of democratization have studied a plethora of international factors in the spread of democracy, including geographic or regional proximity, colonial history, trade and alliance networks, and joint inter-governmental organization (IGO) memberships. Few have studied the role of TSMO networks in democratic diffusion. We theor…
The Varieties of Coups D’état
Interest in authoritarian politics and democratic breakdown has fueled a revival in scholarship on coups d'état. However, this research is held back by the fact that no global coup dataset captures theoretically salient information on the identity of coup-makers, their goals, and the relationship between the coup leaders and the ruling regime. We introduce the Colpus dataset, new global data on coup types and characteristics in the post–World War…
The Longest March
Neighborhood-Level Correlates of Consistent Condom Use among Men Who have Sex with Men
What Front‐Line CBO Staff Can Tell Us About Culturally Anchored Theories of Behavior Change in HIV Prevention for Asian/Pacific Islanders
Few rigorously tested primary prevention programs have been developed to prevent HIV infection among immigrant communities in the United States. This is in part because of the lack of culturally specific behavioral theories that can inform HIV prevention for immigrant communities in the United States. This article aims to develop such theories for a population—Asian/Pacific Islanders (A/PIs) immigrant communities—who have been overlooked in theor…
The Varieties of Coups D’état
Interest in authoritarian politics and democratic breakdown has fueled a revival in scholarship on coups d'état. However, this research is held back by the fact that no global coup dataset captures theoretically salient information on the identity of coup-makers, their goals, and the relationship between the coup leaders and the ruling regime. We introduce the Colpus dataset, new global data on coup types and characteristics in the post–World War…
Neighborhood-Level Correlates of Consistent Condom Use among Men Who have Sex with Men
Reshaping the Threat Environment
Dictators shape regime structures to counter the threats they face. Personalization entails the progressive accumulation of power in the hands of the dictator to minimize internal threats from organized elites in the military and party. However, elites have incentives to resist the personalization to avoid being marginalized by personalist strongmen. We argue that as personalism increases, rival elites, less able to coordinate coup attempts, turn…
Personalization of Power and Mass Uprisings in Dictatorships
Most major nonviolent civil resistance campaigns target autocratic regimes. Yet, most dictators are toppled by their close supporters, not civilian protesters. Building on theories of strategic interactions between leaders, security agents, and protesters, we make three core claims: first, protesters are relatively less likely to mount a major nonviolent uprising against dictatorships with personalized security forces; secondly, personalized secu…
The Rush to Personalize
How do failed coups influence power personalization in dictatorships? While scholars have studied the mechanisms of personalism in dictatorships in detail, little attention has been paid to the timing and determinants of surges in personalism levels. In this article, we propose that personalism can evolve non-linearly, and show that large, quite rapid increases in personalization by dictators occur after a failed coup attempt. The logic is that f…
What Front‐Line CBO Staff Can Tell Us About Culturally Anchored Theories of Behavior Change in HIV Prevention for Asian/Pacific Islanders
Few rigorously tested primary prevention programs have been developed to prevent HIV infection among immigrant communities in the United States. This is in part because of the lack of culturally specific behavioral theories that can inform HIV prevention for immigrant communities in the United States. This article aims to develop such theories for a population—Asian/Pacific Islanders (A/PIs) immigrant communities—who have been overlooked in theor…
African coups in the Covid-19 era
What explains the explosion of coup activity in Africa over the last few years? To answer this question, this article presents narrative summaries—a current history—of all eleven coups attempts in Africa between August 2020 and November 2022. We then discuss the most relevant causal explanations for the observed increase in coup frequency in Africa in this period. Though we find relatively little evidence of direct coup diffusion or democratic ba…
What Front‐Line CBO Staff Can Tell Us About Culturally Anchored Theories of Behavior Change in HIV Prevention for Asian/Pacific Islanders
Few rigorously tested primary prevention programs have been developed to prevent HIV infection among immigrant communities in the United States. This is in part because of the lack of culturally specific behavioral theories that can inform HIV prevention for immigrant communities in the United States. This article aims to develop such theories for a population—Asian/Pacific Islanders (A/PIs) immigrant communities—who have been overlooked in theor…
Neighborhood-Level Correlates of Consistent Condom Use among Men Who have Sex with Men
The Longest March
Activists Against Autocrats
Do transnational social movement organizations (TSMOs) promote the international diffusion of democracy? If so, how? Scholars of democratization have studied a plethora of international factors in the spread of democracy, including geographic or regional proximity, colonial history, trade and alliance networks, and joint inter-governmental organization (IGO) memberships. Few have studied the role of TSMO networks in democratic diffusion. We theor…
The Varieties of Coups D’état
Interest in authoritarian politics and democratic breakdown has fueled a revival in scholarship on coups d'état. However, this research is held back by the fact that no global coup dataset captures theoretically salient information on the identity of coup-makers, their goals, and the relationship between the coup leaders and the ruling regime. We introduce the Colpus dataset, new global data on coup types and characteristics in the post–World War…
Reshaping the Threat Environment
Dictators shape regime structures to counter the threats they face. Personalization entails the progressive accumulation of power in the hands of the dictator to minimize internal threats from organized elites in the military and party. However, elites have incentives to resist the personalization to avoid being marginalized by personalist strongmen. We argue that as personalism increases, rival elites, less able to coordinate coup attempts, turn…
African coups in the Covid-19 era
What explains the explosion of coup activity in Africa over the last few years? To answer this question, this article presents narrative summaries—a current history—of all eleven coups attempts in Africa between August 2020 and November 2022. We then discuss the most relevant causal explanations for the observed increase in coup frequency in Africa in this period. Though we find relatively little evidence of direct coup diffusion or democratic ba…
The Rush to Personalize
How do failed coups influence power personalization in dictatorships? While scholars have studied the mechanisms of personalism in dictatorships in detail, little attention has been paid to the timing and determinants of surges in personalism levels. In this article, we propose that personalism can evolve non-linearly, and show that large, quite rapid increases in personalization by dictators occur after a failed coup attempt. The logic is that f…
Personalization of Power and Mass Uprisings in Dictatorships
Most major nonviolent civil resistance campaigns target autocratic regimes. Yet, most dictators are toppled by their close supporters, not civilian protesters. Building on theories of strategic interactions between leaders, security agents, and protesters, we make three core claims: first, protesters are relatively less likely to mount a major nonviolent uprising against dictatorships with personalized security forces; secondly, personalized secu…
Should the U.S. promote (illiberal) democracy in the Middle East
This article reviews Shadi Hamid’s book The Problem of Democracy: America, the Middle East, and the Rise and Fall of an Idea . It interrogates three key assumptions behind the author’s call for abandoning a “stability first” strategy for a “democracy first” strategy in the Middle East. These include the claim that (1) liberalism and democracy are diverging, (2) Arab dictatorships are brittle, and (3) there is a stark tradeoff between prioritizing…
Taiwan
Taiwan is not just a victim-in-waiting, damsel in distress, or pawn in a new Cold War. Taiwan stands as an exemplar: the world’s first “Chinese democracy” and a democratic David in the shadow of an autocratic Goliath. Taiwan’s success in deepening democracy and resisting Chinese sharp power may hold lessons on how to counter the rising global tide of authoritarianism. To elucidate these lessons, we review Taiwan’s democratic history and ongoing e…
Democracy (9 works) · Political science (9 works) · Law (8 works) · Political economy (8 works) · Politics (8 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Political Conflict and Governance (7 works) · Law (6 works) · Economics (5 works) · Autocracy (3 works)