Self-coup

A self-coup, also called an autocoup (from Spanish autogolpe) or coup from the top, is a form of coup d'état in which a political leader, having come to power through legal means, stays in power through illegal means through the actions of themselves and/or their supporters.^[1] The leader may dissolve or render powerless the national legislature and unlawfully assume extraordinary powers. Other measures may include annulling the nation's constitution, suspending civil courts, and having the head of government assume dictatorial powers.^[2][3]

Cavalry in the streets of Paris during the French coup of 1851, when the democratically elected President Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte seized dictatorial power, and one year later was proclaimed Emperor of the French

From 1946 to the beginning of 2021, an estimated 148 self-coup attempts took place, 110 in autocracies and 38 in democracies.^[4]

Notable events described as self-coups

•  France: President Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (December 2, 1851)^[5]
•  Uruguay: President Juan Lindolfo Cuestas (February 10, 1898)^[6]
•  Austria: Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss (March 15, 1933)^[7]
•  Germany: Chancellor Adolf Hitler (March 23, 1933 / August 2, 1934)^[5][8]
•  Uruguay: President Gabriel Terra (March 31, 1933)^[9]
•  Estonia: Prime Minister in duties of the State Elder Konstantin Päts (March 12, 1934)^[10]
•  Romania: King Michael I of Romania (August 23, 1944)^[11]
•  Bolivia: President Mamerto Urriolagoitía (May 16, 1951)^[12]
•  Pakistan: Governor-General Ghulam Muhammad (April 1953 – September 21, 1954)^[13][14]
•  Indonesia: President Sukarno (July 5, 1959)^[15]
•  Philippines: President Ferdinand Marcos (September 23, 1972)^[5][16]
•  South Korea: President Park Chung Hee (October 17, 1972)^[17]
•  Uruguay: President Juan María Bordaberry (June 27, 1973)^[2]
•  Peru: President Alberto Fujimori (April 5, 1992)^[18]
•  Russia: President Boris Yeltsin (September 21, 1993)^{[19][20][21][22]}
•  Cambodia: Prime Minister Hun Sen (July 1997)^[23][24]
•  Venezuela: President Nicolás Maduro (March 29, 2017)^[25]
•  Peru: President Martín Vizcarra (30 September 2019)^[26][27][28]
•  Malaysia: Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin (29 February 2020)^[29]
•  Russia: President Vladimir Putin (July 4, 2020)^[30][31][32]
•  El Salvador: President Nayib Bukele (May 1, 2021)^[33]
•  Tunisia: President Kais Saied (July 25, 2021)^[34][35][36]
•  Sudan: Chairman of the Sovereignty Council Abdel Fattah al-Burhan (October 25, 2021)^[37]

Notable events described as attempted self-coups

•  Guatemala: President Jorge Serrano Elías (May 25 – June 5, 1993)^[38]
•  Indonesia: President Abdurrahman Wahid (July 1–25, 2001)^[39]
•  Malaysia: Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad (February 23 – March 1, 2020)^[40]
•  United States: President Donald Trump (November 4, 2020 – January 6, 2021; after election loss)^[41][42][43]
•  Peru: President Pedro Castillo (December 7, 2022)^[44]
•  Brazil: President Jair Bolsonaro (October 30, 2022 – December 31, 2022; January 8, 2023; after election loss)^[45][46]
•  Israel: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (ongoing events, since he assumed office on December 29, 2022)^{[47][48][49][50][51][52][53]}
•  South Korea: President Yoon Suk Yeol (December 3–4, 2024)^[54][55]

See also

• Constitutional coup
• Democratic backsliding
• Soft coup

References

1. Chin, John J; Carter, David B; Wright, Joseph G (2021). "The Varieties of Coups D'état: Introducing the Colpus Dataset". International Studies Quarterly. 65 (4): 1040–1051. doi:10.1093/isq/sqab058. ISSN 0020-8833.
2. Kaufman, Edy. Uruguay in Transition: From Civilian to Military Rule. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 978-1-4128-4084-2.
3. Tufekci, Zeynep (December 7, 2020). "This Must Be Your First". The Atlantic. In political science, the term coup refers to the illegitimate overthrow of a sitting government—usually through violence or the threat of violence. The technical term for attempting to stay in power illegitimately—such as after losing an election—is self-coup or autocoup, sometimes autogolpe
4. Nakamura, David (January 5, 2021). "With brazen assault on election, Trump prompts critics to warn of a coup". The Washington Post. Retrieved January 5, 2021.
5. Brownlee, Jason; Miao, Kenny (October 2022). "Why Democracies Survive". Journal of Democracy. 33 (4): 133–149. doi:10.1353/jod.2022.0052. S2CID 252909007. Retrieved October 31, 2023.
6. "URUGUAY UNDER A DICTATOR.; Senor Cuestas Executes a Coup d'Etat and Dissolves the Assembly". The New York Times. February 11, 1898.
7. Weyland, Kurt (February 4, 2021). Assault on Democracy. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781108844338. Retrieved September 14, 2022.
8. "Germany 1933: from democracy to dictatorship". Anne Frank House. September 28, 2018.
9. "The March Revolution in Uruguay 1933". Armed Conflict Events Data.
10. XX sajandi kroonika, I osa (in Estonian). Tallinn: Eesti Entsüklopeediakirjastus. 2002. p. 383.
11. Deletant, Dennis (2006). Hitler's Forgotten Ally: Ion Antonescu and His Regime, Romania 1940–1944. Palgrave Macmillan.
12. "The Bolivian Revolution". Latin American Studies.
13. Shah, Sabir (April 4, 2023). "70-year history of constitutional crises in Pakistan". The News International.
14. Wheeler, Richard S. (January 1955). "Governor General's Rule in Pakistan". Far Eastern Survey. 24 (1). Institute of Pacific Relations: 1–8. doi:10.2307/3024672. JSTOR 3024672.
15. Pauker, Guy J. (1967). "Indonesia: The Year of Transition". Asian Survey. 7 (2): 138–150. doi:10.2307/2642526. ISSN 0004-4687. JSTOR 2642526.
16. "Declaration of Martial Law". Official Gazette. Republic of the Philippines. Retrieved June 18, 2016.
17. Savada, Andrea Matles; Shaw, William (1990). "The Military in Politics". South Korea: A Country Study. Library of Congress Country Studies. Washington, DC: Government Publishing Office.
18. Kenney, Charles D. (2004). Fujimori's coup and the breakdown of democracy in Latin America. University of Notre Dame Press. ISBN 0-268-03171-1.
19. Все перевороты XXI века [All coups of the 21st century]. Kommersant. September 30, 2015.
20. Landfried, Christine (February 7, 2019). Judicial Power: How Constitutional Courts Affect Political Transformations. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781108425667. Retrieved September 14, 2022.
21. Hastedt, Glenn P.; Knickrehm, Kay M. (2003). International Politics in a Changing World. Longman. ISBN 9780205189939. Retrieved September 14, 2022.
22. Maidanik, K. L. (Summer 2000). «He-запад»: современный транзит и перспективы демократизации ["Non-West": modern transition and prospects for democratization] (PDF). Полития (in Russian). 2 (16): 100. В последнее десятилетие – чуть ли не впервые за полтора века – в регионе не произошло ни одного успешного военного переворота. Имели место, правда, один «самопереворот» (президент разогнал парламент) и один случай переноса выборов. [In the last decade – almost for the first time in a century and a half – there has not been a single successful military coup in the region. There has, however, been one 'self-coup' (the president dissolved parliament) and one case of postponed elections.]
23. "Making of a strongman: In July 1997, Hun Sen took complete control of the country – and his party". The Phnom Penh Post. Retrieved October 23, 2023.
24. Pedrosa, Fernando; Noce, Cecilia; Povse, Max (2021). Desafíos actuales de Asia oriental [Current challenges in East Asia] (in Spanish). Eudeba. ISBN 9789502331188.
25. Casey, Nicholas; Torres, Patricia (March 30, 2017). "Venezuela Muzzles Legislature, Moving Closer to One-Man Rule". The New York Times. Retrieved March 31, 2017.
26. "4 claves para entender la crisis política que atraviesa Perú tras la disolución del Congreso (y lo que puede pasar ahora)". BBC News (in Spanish). Retrieved April 24, 2023.
27. "Peru military, police back Vizcarra as rebel lawmakers vow loyalty to VP". Reuters. September 30, 2019. Retrieved April 24, 2023.
28. Montes, Juan; Otis, John (October 2, 2019). "Peruvian Vice President Resigns After Congress Fails to Oust Nation's Leader". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved April 24, 2023.
29. "Malaysia's frustrated 'No. 2' leaders pull off political coup". Nikkei. March 22, 2020.
30. Инвестклимат в России определяется ФСБ»: Сергей Гуриев о новом правительстве и «конституционном самоперевороте [The Investment Climate in Russia Is Determined by the FSB: Sergei Guriev on the New Government and the "Constitutional Self-Coup"] (in Russian). February 6, 2020.
31. Guriev, Sergei (January 18, 2020). "Putin's Meaningless Coup". Project Syndicate.
32. Hill, Fiona (September 7, 2021). There Is Nothing for You Here: Finding Opportunity in the Twenty-First Century. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 9780358574316. Retrieved September 14, 2022.
33. Meléndez-Sánchez, Manuel; Levitsky, Steven (May 20, 2021). "El Salvador's President Launched a 'Self-Coup'. Watch for Creeping Corruption and Authoritarianism". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on June 6, 2021. Retrieved April 26, 2023.
34. Megerisi, Tarek (August 2, 2021). "Saied's Textbook Self-Coup in Tunisia". Dawn.
35. Tamburini, Francesco (2022). "'How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Autocracy': Kais Saied's 'Constitutional Self-Coup' in Tunisia". Journal of Asian and African Studies. 58 (6): 904–921. doi:10.1177/00219096221079322. S2CID 246962926.
36. Cherkaoui, Tarek (August 25, 2021). "OPINION – Tunisia's dangerous moment: A self-coup". Anadolu Agency.
37. Kiwuwa, David (October 27, 2021). "Sudan's self-coup and four factors that will determine what comes next". African Arguments.
38. Barry S. Levitt (2006), "A Desultory Defense of Democracy: OAS Resolution 1080 and the Inter-American Democratic Charter, Latin American Politics and Society, Volume 48, Issue 3, September 2006, Pages: 93–123. pp104-5
39. Ingraham, Christopher (January 22, 2021). "Coup attempts usually usher in long stretches of democratic decline, data shows". The Washington Post.
40. "Mahathir proposes to lead 'unity government' – sources". Rueters. February 25, 2020.
41. Pion-Berlin, David; Bruneau, Thomas; Goetze, Richard B. Jr. (April 7, 2022). "The Trump self-coup attempt: comparisons and civil–military relations". Government and Opposition. FirstView (4): 789–806. doi:10.1017/gov.2022.13. S2CID 248033246.
42. Harvey, Michael (2022). "Introduction: History's Rhymes". In Harvey, Michael (ed.). Donald Trump in Historical Perspective. Routledge. p. 3. doi:10.4324/9781003110361-1. ISBN 978-1-003-11036-1. As with the Beer Hall Putsch, a would-be leader tried to take advantage of an already scheduled event (in Hitler's case, Kahr's speech; in Trump's, Congress's tallying of the electoral votes) to create a dramatic moment with himself at the center of attention, calling for bold action to upend the political order. Unlike Hitler's coup attempt, Trump already held the top of the office, so he was attempting to hold onto power, not seize it (the precise term for Trump's intended action is a 'self-coup' or 'autogolpe'). Thus, Trump was able to plan for the event well in advance and with much greater control, including developing the legal arguments that could be used to justify rejecting the election's results.
43. Castañeda, Ernesto; Jenks, Daniel (April 17, 2023). Costa, Bruno Ferreira; Parton, Nigel (eds.). "January 6th and De-Democratization in the United States". Social Sciences. 12 (4). MDPI: 238. doi:10.3390/socsci12040238. ISSN 2076-0760. What the United States went through on January 6th was an attempt at a self-coup, where Trump would use force to stay as head of state even if abandoning democratic practices in the U.S. Some advised Trump to declare martial law to create a state of emergency and use that as an excuse to stay in power.
44. • Aspinwall, Nick; Chen, Alicia (December 20, 2022). "Peru's Failed Presidential Coup Sparks Democratic Crisis". Foreign Policy. Retrieved March 25, 2023.
    • Villar, Paola (December 7, 2022). "Peru's President Pedro Castillo Stages Self-Coup, Announces Dissolution of Congress". Bloomberg Línea. Retrieved March 25, 2023.
    • Quesada, Juan Diego (December 9, 2022). "Inside the coup in Peru: 'President, what have you done?'". El País English. Retrieved March 25, 2023.
    • "After failed self-coup: Peru's ousted president seeks meeting with rights inspectors". today.rtl.lu. Retrieved March 25, 2023.
    • "High drama in Lima as Peru ousts its president after he attempts self-coup". The Week. Retrieved March 25, 2023.
    • "Peru's new president suggests moving general election forward to April". euronews. December 12, 2022. Retrieved March 25, 2023.
45. Carvalho, Diego (October 17, 2023). "Brazil's Bolsonaro Plotted Coup After Election Defeat, Congressional Probe Finds". Bloomberg. Retrieved January 11, 2024.
46. Arias, Juan (August 25, 2023). "Brazilian military caught in the crossfire after failed coup attempt against Lula's government". El País. Retrieved January 11, 2024.
47. Friedman, Thomas L. (February 14, 2023). "Netanyahu's Judicial Coup Could Destroy His Start-Up Nation". The New York Times. Archived from the original on February 19, 2023. Retrieved August 1, 2023.
48. Friedman, Thomas L. (March 28, 2023). "Netanyahu Cannot Be Trusted". The New York Times. Archived from the original on March 28, 2023. Retrieved August 1, 2023.
49. Kingsley, Patrick (July 23, 2023). "Israel's Identity Hangs in Balance Ahead of Key Vote on New Law". The New York Times. Archived from the original on July 23, 2023. Retrieved August 1, 2023.
50. "A Coup d'État in Israel? : The Bitter Harvest of Colonialism". CrimethInc. March 27, 2023. Retrieved August 1, 2023.
51. Harari, Yuval Noah (March 9, 2023). "This Is Definitely a Coup. Israel Is on Its Way to Becoming a Dictatorship". Haaretz. Archived from the original on March 9, 2023. Retrieved August 1, 2023.
52. Freedland, Jonathan (March 31, 2023). "Netanyahu is leading a coup against his own country. But the threat is not only to Israel". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Archived from the original on April 1, 2023. Retrieved August 1, 2023.
53. Starr, Michael (January 8, 2023). "30,000 march in Tel Aviv against 'coup d'état' Levin judicial reform". The Jerusalem Post. Archived from the original on January 8, 2023. Retrieved August 1, 2023.
54. Palmer, James (December 4, 2024). "How South Koreans Rejected Martial Law". Foreignpolicy.com.
55. Schaefer, Christopher (December 5, 2024). "Lessons From South Korea's Six-Hour Dictatorship". Renew Democracy Initiative.

Further reading

• Arthur A Goldsmith. 2024. "Power Grabs from the Top: A Database of Self-Coups." International Studies Quarterly, Volume 68, Issue 4

External links

• The dictionary definition of self-coup at Wiktionary