Power-sharing ‘discontinuities’: Legitimacy, rivalry, and credibility
| Published date | 01 January 2018 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0951629817729225 |
| Author | Saurabh Pant |
| Date | 01 January 2018 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
Power-sharing
‘discontinuities’: Legitimacy,
rivalry, and credibility
Journal of Theoretical Politics
2018, Vol. 30(1) 147–177
©The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0951629817729225
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Saurabh Pant
Department of Politics, Princeton University, USA
Abstract
Power-sharing arrangements between a leader and a popular outsider can be mutually beneficial
and threatening. The literature has focused primarily on the former’s trade-off where a leader
gains legitimacy when sharing power with a respected outsider but also subsequently creates a
rival who could challenge their rule. Yet this outsider also faces a simultaneous trade-off between
power and credibility in acquiescing to the leadership. I incorporate both coinciding trade-offs
in developing a formal model to examine such power-sharing arrangements which have been
prevalent historically and currently. I illustrate a ‘discontinuity’ in optimal power sharing where a
leader either shares nothing or shares a specific amount to compensate the rival for the rival’s
lost credibility. Counterintuitively, I further show that the leader should share more power with
less trustworthy rivals to reduce their strong incentives to challenge. I then revisit the Investiture
Controversy in medieval Europe using these insights from the model.
Keywords
Formal models; legitimacy; political survival; power sharing
1. Introduction
Power-sharing agreements play an important role in governance. Coalition governments,
in which ministerial portfolios are shared across coalitional partners, arise in both par-
liamentary and presidential systems (Cheibub et al., 2004). At the end of a civil war, the
establishment of a credible power-sharing agreement can be vital to ensure that the two
warring sides do not fall back into violence (Walter, 2002). In autocracies, the tenure
of leadership is often dependent on how the dictator chooses to divide power between
themselves, a chosen elite, and the military (Svolik, 2009, 2012). Unlike power shar-
ing amongst actors that hold government positions or actors that deliver compliance
Corresponding author:
Saurabh Pant, Department of Politics, Princeton University, 130 Corwin Hall, Princeton, NJ 08544-1012, USA.
Email: pant@princeton.edu
148 Journal of Theoretical Politics 30(1)
through force, sometimes political leaders ‘share’ their resources with popular outsiders
in exchange for their approval to obtain ‘legitimacy.’
This problem presents trade-offs for both the leader and the outsider. First, although
the leader can increase their support by obtaining legitimacy from sharing power, the
leader is also simultaneously creating a potential ‘rival’ that can turn around and chal-
lenge them for all the power. Furthermore, the probability that the rival wins in such a
challenge is plausibly increasing in the amount of power that is shared with them. Thus,
the leader gains legitimacy but also sets themselves up for a potential takeover. Second,
the rival often derives their popularity from their independence. Complyingwith a leader
might allow this popular outsider to acquire more power (pecuniary and otherwise), but
it would also diminish their standing amongst their followers if it involves straying too
far from their ideals. The rival would then need to net out the effectsof the loss in follow-
ers and the increase in power when deciding whether to pose a challenge to the existing
leader. Therefore, when deciding to share power, the leader needs to calculate the optimal
amount of power to share such that they gain legitimacy but do not incentivize the rival
to challenge them.
Historical and modern cases reveal that the threat of a takeover and the concern for
credibility were real issues. The history of the Papacy in medieval Europe (Blumen-
thal, 1988; Morrison, 1971), Shia clerics in the Safavid Empire (Abisaab, 2004), and
the Catholic Church in Latin America (Schwaller, 2011) all include stories illustrating
trade-offs of this type vis-à-vis a leader facing a religious official. Similarly, recent past
and current interactions between Russia and China’s political leaderships and religious
institutions depict mutually beneficial but potentially mutually threatening relationships
(Koesel, 2014). In all these cases, political leaders used religion as a source of legitimacy
but were also aware of the threat it could pose in undermining their power. Concurrently,
the religious officials in these historical and modern episodes acknowledged the increased
rents and perquisites that came with supporting the political leaders, but were also wor-
ried about their subsequent loss in credibility in the eyes of their original followers. This
latter concern sometimes drove religious establishments to challenge the leadership that
initially empowered them. Thus, political leaders need to account for both the dynamics
of legitimacy and rivalry when deciding how optimally to share power.
In this way, this paper differs from the existing literature on power sharing, which
has tended to focus on only one of the trade-offs: the fact that sharing power can
empower a potential rival. Yet, the simultaneous second trade-off—the fact that cer-
tain ‘legitimacy-granting’ institutions can potentially lose credibility from such quid-
pro-quo relationships—has been less explored. A substantial amount of notable power-
sharing relationships contains both of these strategic tensions, and it is thus necessary to
account for both dynamics in order to fully appreciate the foundations, outcomes, and
peculiarities of such decision-making processes.
This paper develops a model of power sharing incorporating both of these trade-offs.
Counterintuitively, I depict how a leader should be more concerned with sharing too little
power as opposed to sharing too much. The rival needs to be compensated sufficiently
to discourage them from undertaking the gamble of challenging the leader. With this
formal model, I illustrate how a ‘discontinuity’ exists, where the rival challenges and
attacks only if the shared power is less than a critical point. The leader, in equilibrium,
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