使用言語：英語

報告者：Paul Schuler (Political science at the University of Arizona School of Government and Public Policy, SGPP)

タイトル：Cults of Domination or Legitimation? Anthropomorphism and the Roots of Founding Father Personality Cults in East Asia

要旨：How do founding father personality cults emerge? Existing work suggests that personality cults follow a personalization of power and are designed to dominate society and rivals. In contrast, we argue some regimes create cults of legitimation, where elites promote a leader’s symbolical image to generate emotional connections to the masses. We explain why regimes use personality cults instead of relying solely on abstract symbols. Applying social psychology research on anthropomorphism, we argue that during periods surrounding independence, elites are incentivized to anthropomorphize the nation through a founding father cult to bind citizens to the regime and state. Using the three cases of Vietnam, China, and Indonesia, we process trace cult emergence to demonstrate the plausibility of our theory. Our theory and findings shed light on recent debates regarding the competing roles of institutions and legitimation in bolstering authoritarian regimes. We suggest that both frameworks are indispensable to understanding cult emergence.

略歴：Paul Schuler is an Associate Professor of political science at the University of Arizona School of Government and Public Policy. He has written extensively about Vietnam and its political institutions. Most recently, he published United Front: Projecting Solidary Through Deliberation in Vietnam’s Single-Party Legislature with Stanford University Press. His current projects involve gender and participation in Vietnam and personality cults.