Conventional wisdom holds that great power patrons prop up client dictatorships. But this is generally assumed rather than systematically analyzed. This article provides the first comprehensive analysis of the relationship between foreign sponsorship and authoritarian regime survival, using an original data set of all autocratic client regimes in the postwar period. The results demonstrate that patronage from Western powers—the United States, France, and the United Kingdom—is not associated with client regime survival. Rather, it’s only Soviet sponsorship that reduced the risk of regime collapse. The author explains this variation by considering the effects of foreign sponsorship on the likelihood of military coups d’état. He argues that the Soviet Union directly aided its clients by imposing a series of highly effective coup prevention strategies. By contrast, the US and its allies didn’t provide such aid, leaving regimes vulnerable to military overthrow.

中文翻译：

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客户制度的持久性

传统观点认为，大国赞助人支持客户独裁。但这通常是假设的，而不是系统地分析的。本文使用战后时期所有专制客户政权的原始数据集，首次全面分析了外国赞助与威权政权生存之间的关系。结果表明，来自西方大国——美国、法国和英国——的赞助与附庸政权的生存无关。相反，只有苏联的赞助降低了政权崩溃的风险。作者通过考虑外国赞助对军事政变可能性的影响来解释这种变化。他认为，苏联通过实施一系列高效的政变预防策略直接帮助其客户。