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At a time when the gradual collapse of democratic norms and processes is obvious to anyone who cares to read the headlines, the tension between self and society is fertile soil for understanding democratic decay. While we may wish to see democracy refortified, the fact remains that citizens equipped to handle democratic practices are a necessary precondition for democratic revitalization. Yet, the deterioration of democracy suggests breakdown in the gears of democratic production of the democratic citizen. The following chapter examines a particular cancer that is antithetical to democracy and has afflicted your author – the authoritarian personality. Critical theorists and social scientists in the mid-twentieth century identified this personality disposition as one that cultivates receptivity to fascism and is today the beating heart of right-wing extremism in its particular incarnation as Trumpism. I develop the theory of the authoritarian personality as it shaped and inflamed at the familial, societal, and global levels. Contributing to the project of planetary sociology, I demonstrate how the changes occurring on the world stage incite the most pernicious and antidemocratic features of the authoritarian personality. All the while, I subject myself to critical scrutiny in order to illustrate the inner-workings of this personality disposition. Your author stands before you as a recovering authoritarian and hopes that by reading this chapter, you will begin to see authoritarianism all around you, perhaps even within yourself.

Ahmet Kuru replies to two important and critical reviews of his book, Islam, Authoritarianism, and Underdevelopment: A Global and Historical Comparison (Cambridge University Press, 2019), in this volume. He explains why he disagrees with certain points in Knut Vikør's and Roel Meijer's reviews. He particularly reiterates the ulema's negative roles in contemporary Muslim societies. From Egypt's Al-Azhar to Turkey's Diyanet, from Iran's mullahs to Pakistan's sharia courts, the ulema hold the power to shape the public discourse in many ways, such as controlling Islamic education, issuing fatwas, and imposing blasphemy laws, in partnership with the state. The ulema have been the main ally of the rulers in marginalizing intellectuals and economic entrepreneurs, and thus, they share the responsibility with the rulers in problems of authoritarianism and underdevelopment.

This chapter makes a brief incursion through a trajectory of over three decades of activism by the Centre for the Study of Violence at the University of São Paulo (Núcleo de Estudos da Violência in Portuguese, NEV) in Brazil, recovering the legacy of its forms of activism and academic reflection while analysing the interfaces between violence and democracy in Brazil. The 1980s in Brazil were marked by expectations of profound political and social changes in the context of democratic transition. After 21 years of dictatorship (1964–1985), the military gradually withdrew from government, returning the state’s executive branch to civilian representatives. This was a moment of optimism for progressive groups and social movements, which had fought to dismantle the tradition of arbitrariness and violations of rights perpetrated by the state during the military dictatorship. In this context, NEV was founded as a research unit linked to the Faculty of Philosophy, Letters and Human Sciences. Its core academic objective was to analyse and scientifically denounce the conjuncture of violence and human rights violations that remained recurrent; consequently, it demonstrated the continuity of unequal power relations, social and cultural practices that fuel authoritarianism in times considered not authoritarian.

Political Science in the United States has focused too much on variable-oriented, quantitative methods and thus lost its ability to ask “big questions.” Stein Rokkan (d. 1979) was an eminent comparativist who asked big questions and provided such qualitative tools as conceptual maps, grids, and clustered comparisons. Ibn Khaldun (d. 1406), arguably the first social scientist, also asked big questions and provided a universal explanation about the dialectical relationship between nomads and sedentary people. This article analyzes to what extent Ibn Khaldun's concepts of asabiyya and sedentary culture help understand the rise and fall of the Muslim civilization. It also explores my alternative, class-based perspective in Islam, Authoritarianism, and Underdevelopment. Moreover, the article explores how Rokkan's analysis of cultural, geographical, economic, and religio-political variations within Western European states can provide insights to the examination of such variations in the Muslim world.

Using a multilevel model, this study examined how paternalistic leadership behaviors, including authoritarianism, morality and benevolence, influence followers' performance.

A sample of 556 leader–follower dyads from 66 groups in a manufacturing firm in China was collected for analysis. Descriptive statistics and multi-level regression analyses were used to analyze the data.

The results indicated that group efficacy mediates the relationship between authoritarian leadership and followers' performance and that self-efficacy mediates the relationship between benevolent leadership and followers' performance. In addition, the positive relationship between self-efficacy and followers' performance is weaker when followers exhibit higher levels of group efficacy.

The data were collected in a manufacturing firm in China, it is difficult to generalize the results to other settings.

Managers should use their abilities and skills to interpret which paternalistic leadership styles their followers prefer, so as to improve their performance.

This study developed a multilevel model to examine the mediating processes of group efficacy and self-efficacy in the effect of PL behaviors, including authoritarianism, benevolence and morality, on followers' performance.

The aim of the study is to assess the extent to which Taoist philosophy offers thematic and ethical insights relevant to current global crises, including climate change, food insecurity, renewed conflict and increased authoritarianism.

A critical review of specific verses from the Tao Te Ching and research sources relevant to them is carried out.

Taoist philosophy, of ancient origins, is surprisingly relevant to modern crises. While not offering definitive answers, it does provide thematic and ethical insights for reorienting governance in more productive ways.

While there is a large literature on Taoist philosophy itself, there is a paucity of research articles on the modern relevance of Taoist philosophy to pressing current issues. The article brings together and assesses these sources, considering relevant research.

Integrating the pathway model of meaningful work and the intrinsic motivation principle of creativity, the authors investigate why, when and how paternalistic leadership relates to employee creativity in the Chinese organizational context. The authors suggest that the meaning of work (MOW) mediates the relationship between paternalistic leadership and employee creativity. The authors further identify perspective taking as a moderator in the mediated relationship for the path from MOW to creativity.

The authors relied on a sample of 340 employee-supervisor dyads collected from multiple organizations located in Eastern China to test the study hypotheses.

Results indicated that MOW mediated the positive relationships between the benevolence and morality dimensions of paternalistic leadership and employee creativity, and the negative relationship between the authoritarianism dimension of paternalistic leadership and employee creativity. Further, the indirect relationships between the three dimensions of paternalistic leadership (i.e. authoritarianism, benevolence and morality) and employee creativity through MOW were more pronounced when perspective taking was higher rather than lower.

Through a meaning-based perspective, the authors demonstrate that a culture-specific managerial philosophy (i.e. paternalistic leadership) shapes Chinese employees' perceptions of meaningful work and their subsequent creative performance. This paper complements the dominant focus on Western leadership in the creativity literature and denotes that paternalistic leadership matters for employee creativity in Chinese organizations.

This study aims to examine whether country of residence, sex trafficking attitudes, complainant gender, juror gender and right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) influenced juror decision-making within a sex trafficking case.

Jury-eligible participants from the USA and the UK participated in an online juror experiment in which an independent group design was used to manipulate the complainant’s gender. Participants completed the juror decision scale, the sex trafficking attitudes scale and the RWA scale.

Sex trafficking attitudes predicted the believability of both the defendant and complainant. Greater negative beliefs about victims predicted greater defendant believability and lower complainant believability. US jurors reported greater believability of both the complainant and defendant, and RWA was associated with greater defendant believability. However, none of the other factors, including complainant and juror gender, predicted participants’ verdicts. The findings suggest juror verdicts in sex trafficking cases may be less influenced by extra-legal factors, although further research is needed, especially with a more ambiguous case.

This is one of the few cross-cultural comparison studies in the area of jury decision-making, specifically regarding sex trafficking cases. The findings indicated that US participants held more problematic attitudes about sex trafficking than their UK counterparts, although all participants held problematic attitudes about sex trafficking. However, those attitudes did not affect verdict formation about either a male or female complainant. Participants who were more knowledgeable about sex trafficking reported greater complainant believability, suggesting that educational interventions may provide greater support for victims in court.