Self-coup

Cavalry in the streets of Paris, after President Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte seized dictatorial power in the 1851 French coup d'état

A self-coup, also called an autocoup (from Spanish autogolpe) or coup from the top, is a form of coup d'état in which a political leader uses illegal means to stay in office or to vastly increase their power. The leader may dissolve or render powerless the national legislature and unlawfully assume extraordinary powers. Other measures may include annulling the constitution, suspending civil courts, and having the head of government assume dictatorial powers.

From 1946 to the beginning of 2021, an estimated 148 self-coup attempts took place, 110 in autocracies and 38 in democracies.

List of self-coups

Notable events described as attempted self-coups

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Attributed to multiple sources:
  2. ↑ Attributed to multiple sources:

References

  1. ↑ Chin, John J; Carter, David B; Wright, Joseph G (2021). "The Varieties of Coups D'état: Introducing the Colpus Dataset". International Studies Quarterly. 65 (4): 1040–1051. doi:10.1093/isq/sqab058.
  2. 1 2 Kaufman, Edy. Uruguay in Transition: From Civilian to Military Rule. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 978-1-4128-4084-2.[date missing][page needed]
  3. ↑ Tufekci, Zeynep (December 7, 2020). "This Must Be Your First". The Atlantic. In political science, the term coup refers to the illegitimate overthrow of a sitting government — usually through violence or the threat of violence. The technical term for attempting to stay in power illegitimately — such as after losing an election — is self-coup or autocoup, sometimes autogolpe
  4. ↑ Nakamura, David (January 5, 2021). "With brazen assault on election, Trump prompts critics to warn of a coup". The Washington Post. ProQuest 2475221202. Retrieved January 5, 2021.
  5. ↑ Hemel, Daniel J. (2022). "Self-Coup and the Constitution". Constitutional Commentary. 37 (3): 315–364. doi:10.24926/26390742.2442. hdl:11299/258550. SSRN 4411491.
  6. ↑ Chamorro Cardenal, Pedro Joaquín (1951). Historia de la Federación de la América Central: 1823–1840 [History of the Federation of Central America: 1823–1840] (PDF) (in Spanish). Madrid, Spain: Hispanic Cultural Editions. p. 187. OCLC 1172113044. Retrieved September 28, 2025.
  7. 1 2 3 Brownlee, Jason; Miao, Kenny (October 2022). "Why Democracies Survive". Journal of Democracy. 33 (4): 133–149. doi:10.1353/jod.2022.0052.
  8. ↑ "URUGUAY UNDER A DICTATOR.; Senor Cuestas Executes a Coup d'Etat and Dissolves the Assembly". The New York Times. February 11, 1898.
  9. ↑ Weyland, Kurt (February 4, 2021). Assault on Democracy. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781108844338. Retrieved September 14, 2022.
  10. ↑ "Germany 1933: from democracy to dictatorship". Anne Frank House. September 28, 2018.
  11. ↑ "The March Revolution in Uruguay 1933". Armed Conflict Events Data.
  12. ↑ XX sajandi kroonika, I osa (in Estonian). Tallinn: Eesti Entsüklopeediakirjastus. 2002. p. 383.
  13. ↑ "The Emergence of an Authoritarian Regime in Latvia, 1932–1934" (PDF). Retrieved November 10, 2026.
  14. ↑ "A very Brazilian coup". openDemocracy.
  15. ↑ "El barro de la historia - El golpe de 1942". sites.google.com (in Spanish). Retrieved August 6, 2023.
  16. ↑ Deletant, Dennis (2006). Hitler's Forgotten Ally: Ion Antonescu and His Regime, Romania 1940–1944. Palgrave Macmillan.
  17. ↑ "The Bolivian Revolution". Latin American Studies.
  18. ↑ Shah, Sabir (April 4, 2023). "70-year history of constitutional crises in Pakistan". The News International.
  19. ↑ Wheeler, Richard S. (January 1955). "Governor General's Rule in Pakistan". Far Eastern Survey. 24 (1). Institute of Pacific Relations: 1–8. doi:10.2307/3024672. JSTOR 3024672.
  20. ↑ Pauker, Guy J. (1967). "Indonesia: The Year of Transition". Asian Survey. 7 (2): 138–150. doi:10.2307/2642526. JSTOR 2642526.
  21. ↑ "Declaration of Martial Law". Official Gazette. Republic of the Philippines. Retrieved June 18, 2016.
  22. ↑ Savada, Andrea Matles; Shaw, William (1990). "The Military in Politics". South Korea: A Country Study. Library of Congress Country Studies. Washington, DC: Government Publishing Office.
  23. ↑ "PROCLAMATION BY HIS MAJESTY KING SOBHUZA II 12TH APRIL 1973" (PDF). International Commission of Jurists. April 16, 1973.
  24. ↑ Dlamini, Hlengiwe Portia (2019). "From King Sobhuza II's Auto-Coup d'État to the Era of Constitutional Void and Royal Benevolent Despotism". A Constitutional History of the Kingdom of Eswatini (Swaziland), 1960–1982. African Histories and Modernities. pp. 279–337. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-24777-5_7. ISBN 978-3-030-24776-8.
  25. ↑ Kenney, Charles D. (2004). Fujimori's coup and the breakdown of democracy in Latin America. University of Notre Dame Press. ISBN 0-268-03171-1.
  26. ↑ Все перевороты XXI века [All coups of the 21st century]. Kommersant. September 30, 2015.
  27. ↑ Landfried, Christine (February 7, 2019). Judicial Power: How Constitutional Courts Affect Political Transformations. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781108425667. Retrieved September 14, 2022.
  28. ↑ Hastedt, Glenn P.; Knickrehm, Kay M. (2003). International Politics in a Changing World. Longman. ISBN 9780205189939. Retrieved September 14, 2022.
  29. ↑ Maidanik, K. L. (Summer 2000). «He-запад»: современный транзит и перспективы демократизации ["Non-West": modern transition and prospects for democratization] (PDF). Полития (in Russian). 2 (16): 100. В последнее десятилетие – чуть ли не впервые за полтора века – в регионе не произошло ни одного успешного военного переворота. Имели место, правда, один «самопереворот» (президент разогнал парламент) и один случай переноса выборов. [In the last decade – almost for the first time in a century and a half – there has not been a single successful military coup in the region. There has, however, been one 'self-coup' (the president dissolved parliament) and one case of postponed elections.]
  30. ↑ "Making of a strongman: In July 1997, Hun Sen took complete control of the country – and his party". The Phnom Penh Post. Retrieved October 23, 2023.
  31. ↑ Pedrosa, Fernando; Noce, Cecilia; Povse, Max (2021). Desafíos actuales de Asia oriental [Current challenges in East Asia] (in Spanish). Eudeba. ISBN 9789502331188.
  32. ↑ Casey, Nicholas; Torres, Patricia (March 30, 2017). "Venezuela Muzzles Legislature, Moving Closer to One-Man Rule". The New York Times. Retrieved March 31, 2017.
  33. ↑ "4 claves para entender la crisis política que atraviesa Perú tras la disolución del Congreso (y lo que puede pasar ahora)". BBC News (in Spanish). Retrieved April 24, 2023.
  34. ↑ "Peru military, police back Vizcarra as rebel lawmakers vow loyalty to VP". Reuters. September 30, 2019. Retrieved April 24, 2023.
  35. ↑ Montes, Juan; Otis, John (October 2, 2019). "Peruvian Vice President Resigns After Congress Fails to Oust Nation's Leader". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved April 24, 2023.
  36. ↑ "Malaysia's frustrated 'No. 2' leaders pull off political coup". Nikkei. March 22, 2020.
  37. ↑ Инвестклимат в России определяется ФСБ»: Сергей Гуриев о новом правительстве и «конституционном самоперевороте [The Investment Climate in Russia Is Determined by the FSB: Sergei Guriev on the New Government and the "Constitutional Self-Coup"] (in Russian). February 6, 2020.
  38. ↑ Guriev, Sergei (January 18, 2020). "Putin's Meaningless Coup". Project Syndicate.
  39. ↑ Hill, Fiona (September 7, 2021). There Is Nothing for You Here: Finding Opportunity in the Twenty-First Century. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 9780358574316. Retrieved September 14, 2022.
  40. ↑ Meléndez-Sánchez, Manuel; Levitsky, Steven (May 20, 2021). "El Salvador's President Launched a 'Self-Coup'. Watch for Creeping Corruption and Authoritarianism". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on June 6, 2021. Retrieved April 26, 2023.
  41. ↑ Megerisi, Tarek (August 2, 2021). "Saied's Textbook Self-Coup in Tunisia". Dawn.
  42. ↑ Tamburini, Francesco (September 2023). "'How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Autocracy': Kais Saied's 'Constitutional Self-Coup' in Tunisia". Journal of Asian and African Studies. 58 (6): 904–921. doi:10.1177/00219096221079322.
  43. ↑ Cherkaoui, Tarek (August 25, 2021). "OPINION – Tunisia's dangerous moment: A self-coup". Anadolu Agency.
  44. ↑ Kiwuwa, David (October 27, 2021). "Sudan's self-coup and four factors that will determine what comes next". African Arguments.
  45. ↑ Levitt, Barry S. (2006). "A Desultory Defense of Democracy: OAS Resolution 1080 and the Inter-American Democratic Charter". Latin American Politics and Society. 48 (3): 93–123. doi:10.1111/j.1548-2456.2006.tb00357.x. JSTOR 4490479. Project MUSE 202008.
  46. ↑ Ingraham, Christopher (January 22, 2021). "Coup attempts usually usher in long stretches of democratic decline, data shows". The Washington Post.
  47. ↑ "Mahathir proposes to lead 'unity government' – sources". Reuters. February 25, 2020.
  48. ↑ Pion-Berlin, David; Bruneau, Thomas; Goetze, Richard B. (October 2023). "The Trump Self-Coup Attempt: Comparisons and Civil–Military Relations". Government and Opposition. 58 (4): 789–806. doi:10.1017/gov.2022.13. hdl:10945/72654.
  49. ↑ Harvey, Michael (2022). "Introduction". Donald Trump in Historical Perspective. pp. 1–10. doi:10.4324/9781003110361-1. ISBN 978-1-003-11036-1. p. 3: As with the Beer Hall Putsch, a would-be leader tried to take advantage of an already scheduled event (in Hitler's case, Kahr's speech; in Trump's, Congress's tallying of the electoral votes) to create a dramatic moment with himself at the center of attention, calling for bold action to upend the political order. Unlike Hitler's coup attempt, Trump already held the top of the office, so he was attempting to hold onto power, not seize it (the precise term for Trump's intended action is a 'self-coup' or 'autogolpe'). Thus, Trump was able to plan for the event well in advance and with much greater control, including developing the legal arguments that could be used to justify rejecting the election's results.
  50. ↑ Castañeda, Ernesto; Jenks, Daniel (April 17, 2023). Costa, Bruno Ferreira; Parton, Nigel (eds.). "January 6th and De-Democratization in the United States". Social Sciences. 12 (4). MDPI: 238. doi:10.3390/socsci12040238. What the United States went through on January 6th was an attempt at a self-coup, where Trump would use force to stay as head of state even if abandoning democratic practices in the U.S. Some advised Trump to declare martial law to create a state of emergency and use that as an excuse to stay in power.
  51. ↑
  52. ↑ Carvalho, Diego (October 17, 2023). "Brazil's Bolsonaro Plotted Coup After Election Defeat, Congressional Probe Finds". Bloomberg. Retrieved January 11, 2024.
  53. ↑ Arias, Juan (August 25, 2023). "Brazilian military caught in the crossfire after failed coup attempt against Lula's government". El País. Retrieved January 11, 2024.
  54. ↑ Friedman, Thomas L. (February 14, 2023). "Netanyahu's Judicial Coup Could Destroy His Start-Up Nation". The New York Times. Retrieved August 1, 2023.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link)
  55. ↑ Friedman, Thomas L. (March 28, 2023). "Netanyahu Cannot Be Trusted". The New York Times. Retrieved August 1, 2023.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link)
  56. ↑ Kingsley, Patrick (July 23, 2023). "Israel's Identity Hangs in Balance Ahead of Key Vote on New Law". The New York Times. Retrieved August 1, 2023.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link)
  57. ↑ "A Coup d'État in Israel? : The Bitter Harvest of Colonialism". CrimethInc. March 27, 2023. Retrieved August 1, 2023.
  58. ↑ Harari, Yuval Noah (March 9, 2023). "This Is Definitely a Coup. Israel Is on Its Way to Becoming a Dictatorship". Haaretz. Retrieved August 1, 2023.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link)
  59. ↑ Freedland, Jonathan (March 31, 2023). "Netanyahu is leading a coup against his own country. But the threat is not only to Israel". The Guardian. Retrieved August 1, 2023.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link)
  60. ↑ Starr, Michael (January 8, 2023). "30,000 march in Tel Aviv against 'coup d'état' Levin judicial reform". The Jerusalem Post. Retrieved August 1, 2023.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link)
  61. ↑ Palmer, James (December 4, 2024). "How South Koreans Rejected Martial Law". Foreignpolicy.com.
  62. ↑ Schaefer, Christopher (December 5, 2024). "Lessons From South Korea's Six-Hour Dictatorship". Renew Democracy Initiative.
  63. ↑ Naim, Moises (March 18, 2025). "Is Trump Executing a Self-Coup?". Foreignpolicy.com. Retrieved June 25, 2026.

Further reading