No autocrat is invincible: power accumulation, protest, emotion and the downfall of Sheikh Hasina in Bangladesh

Why and how is it that some loosely organised, largely non-violent movements manage to topple strong, consolidated autocracies, while many mass-mobilised movements fail? To understand this puzzle, we examine the origins and downfall of highly consolidated party-based autocratic rule in Bangladesh under Sheikh Hasina. We postulate that undermining the foundational pillars that sustain and consolidate autocratic rule can lead to its eventual downfall. To pursue our argument, we apply Gerschewski’s three pillars of autocratic consolidation, namely legitimation, repression and co-optation, to the case of Bangladesh. We argue that these three pillars help to understand why Sheikh Hasina’s regime once seemed unassailable. By critically analysing the events, actors and distinctiveness of the protest movement, we show how the brutality of the Hasina regime sparked emotional responses that created moral shock for the people of Bangladesh. As a result, many people took to the streets to resist, eventually incapacitating the regime to the extent that it could not use the pillars that had consolidated its power. Prior research and theory on the emotions of protest and social movements are used to analyse why this particular protest movement succeeded while similar past efforts failed.