🔗 Authoritarian Capitalism

Authoritarian capitalism, or illiberal capitalism, is an economic system in which a capitalist market economy exists alongside an authoritarian government. Related to and overlapping with state capitalism, a system in which the state undertakes commercial activity, authoritarian capitalism combines private property and the functioning of market forces with repression of dissent, restrictions on freedom of speech and either a lack of elections or an electoral system with a single dominant political party.

Political scientists disagree on the long-run sustainability of authoritarian capitalism, with arguments both for and against the long-term viability of political repression alongside a free-market capitalist economic system.

Countries commonly referred to as being authoritarian capitalist states include China since the economic reforms, Hungary under Viktor Orbán, Russia under Vladimir Putin, Singapore under Lee Kuan Yew and Turkey under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as well as fascist regimes and military dictatorships during the Cold War. Nazi Germany has also been described as authoritarian capitalist.