Regime change is when one government covertly or overtly interferes with the leadership or political power structure of another country. This may involve backing a military coup or overthrowing the existing regime, with the goal of replacing it with another.
The United States is no stranger to regime-change policies. Its interventions are typically based on the notion that foreign polities have leaders who are corrupt and do not serve America’s interests. The argument goes that supplanting these leaders with pro-American ones would be a good thing. However, academic research shows that armed regime-change missions rarely succeed as intended and often produce unintended consequences such as humanitarian crises and destabilization within the target state.
Our research on the mechanics of regime change focuses on why and when these strategies fail. We find that a key reason why forcible regime change is so difficult is that it requires citizens to contribute a large amount of effort to the revolution. Leaders must design their rewards to entice citizens to join the uprising, and they must account for citizen coordination so that the overall amount of effort is optimal.
While there are times when regime-change policies can make sense (such as when a foreign regime is committing atrocities that warrants replacement), officials should consider the potential for these strategies to spiral into lengthy institution-building missions and their costs before advocating them. Policymakers should also realize that even if a reformed regime has good intentions, it will be hard to sustain these intentions over the long-term without significant outside support.