Tutelary Power and Autocratic Legitimacy: Experimental Evidence from Kazakhstan’s Diarchy

In electoral autocracies where election results significantly influence regime stability, new leaders need to gather public support despite their shaky political support base. To overcome this problem, autocracies often rely on tutelage, in which a former autocrat helps a new leader retain public support as a guardian. This article explores whether autocratic guardianship in fact boosts popular support by conducting survey experiments in Kazakhstan, where Kassym-Jomart Tokayev assumed the presidential position from the long-serving autocrat Nursultan Nazarbayev. By using the item count technique and endorsement experiment to elicit truthful responses, we find that the successor Tokayev is more popular than the guardian Nazarbayev, and thus Nazarbayev’s involvement in decision-making does not necessarily increase public support for policies. Our analysis suggests that, contrary to the proclaimed benefits of tutelage, whether tutelary power contributes to garnering popular support depends on the perceived quality of guardians.