Family dictatorship Totally Explained

Everything about Family Dictatorship totally explained

A family dictatorship, in political science terms a personalistic regime, is a form of dictatorship that operates much like an absolute monarchy, yet occurs in a nominally republican state. That is to say, the key leader is a president or prime minister and not a king or emperor. When the dictator of a family dictatorship dies, one of his relatives (usually his son) becomes the new ruler of the country. This transition often occurs after years of "grooming" the dictator's successor as heir apparent.
What makes a family dictatorship unique is that this hereditary order of succession isn't formally enshrined in law, as it's in a monarchy.

Successful transitions of power

Dates in parentheses denote the period of rule.

England: Oliver Cromwell (1653-1658) succeeded by his son Richard Cromwell (1658-1659)

Paraguay: José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia (1814-1840), succeeded by his nephew Carlos Antonio López (1840-1862), succeeded by his son, Francisco Solano López (1862-1870)

Costa Rica: Tomás Guardia Gutiérrez (1870-1876, de facto 1876-1877, 1877-1882), succeeded by his brother-in-law Próspero Fernández Oreamuno (1882-1885), succeeded by his posthumous son-in-law Bernardo Soto Alfaro (1885-1890)

El Salvador: Carlos Meléndez (1915-1918), succeeded by his brother Jorge Meléndez (1919-1923), succeeded by his brother-in-law Alfonso Quiñónez Molina (acting 1918-1919, 1923-1927)

Nicaragua: Anastasio Somoza García (1937-1947, 1950-1956), succeeded by his son Luis Somoza Debayle (1956-1963, de facto 1963-1967), succeeded by his brother Anastasio Somoza Debayle (1967-1972, de facto 1972-1974, 1974-1979)

North Korea: Kim Il-sung (1948-1994), succeeded by his son Kim Jong-il (1994- ). Kim Jong-il didn't officially take office until 1997, when his father was given the position of Eternal President.

Haiti: François Duvalier (1957-1971), succeeded by his son Jean-Claude Duvalier (1971-1986)

Togo: Gnassingbé Eyadéma (1967-2005), succeeded his son Faure Gnassingbé (2005- ). Under international pressure, Faure had to resign on February 25, 2005, but was re-elected in April.

Syria: Hafez al-Assad (1971-2000), succeeded by his son Bashar al-Assad (2000- ). Bashar's elder brother, Basil al-Assad, had been designated for the presidency but died in 1994, six years prior to his father's death.

Djibouti: Hassan Gouled Aptidon (1977-1999), succeeded by his nephew Ismail Omar Guelleh (1999- )

Azerbaijan: Heydar Aliyev (1993-2003), succeeded by his son Ilham Aliyev (2003- )

Congo-Kinshasa: Laurent-Désiré Kabila (1997-2001), succeeded by his son Joseph Kabila (2001- ). Joseph Kabila was democratically elected in October 2006.

Cuba: Fidel Castro (prime minister 1959-1976, president 1976-2008), succeeded on an interim basis and later permanently by his brother, Raúl Castro (acting president 2006-2008, president 2008- )

Indirect successions

Republic of China (from 1949 on Taiwan): Chiang Kai-shek (1928-1975) indirectly succeeded by his son Chiang Ching-kuo (1978-1988)

Singapore: Lee Kuan Yew (1965-1990) indirectly succeeded as Prime Minister of Singapore by his son Lee Hsien Loong (2004-incumbent)

Unsuccessful transitions of power

Dominican Republic: Rafael Trujillo (de facto 1930-1961, with brother Héctor serving as figurehead president 1952-1960), nominally succeeded by his son Ramfis Trujillo for a few months in 1961; Ramfis failed to fully consolidate his power over the country and was overthrown.

Romania: Nicolae Ceauşescu's heir apparent was his son Nicu Ceauşescu.

Zaire: Mobutu Sese Seko's heir apparent was his son Nyiwa, who held several cabinet posts and was being groomed to succeed his father; however, this succession never came to fruition, as not only was Nyiwa killed by AIDS in 1994, but Mobutu himself was later overthrown (in 1997) by Laurent Kabila

Potential successions

Egypt: Popular and scholarly opinion holds that Gamal Mubarak is being groomed to succeed his father Hosni to the presidency upon the elder Mubarak's death; this hasn't yet come to pass. The younger Mubarak is currently Chair of the Policy Planning Committee of the ruling National Democratic Party, giving him substantial power as Egypt is a de facto single-party state. Both the Egyptian government and the Mubarak family deny plans of an inherited transfer of power.Further Information

Get more info on 'Family Dictatorship'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://family_dictatorship.totallyexplained.com">Family dictatorship Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.