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Revision as of 07:26, 4 May 2003 by Alex756 (talk | contribs) (typo)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)A dictatorship is a government headed by a dictator.
Originally a legitimate military office in the Roman Republic, the dictator was given his powers by the Senate. The dictator had absolute power, but for a limited time.
In the twentieth century, the term dictatorship has come to mean a government in which absolute power is concentrated in the hands of a dictator and sometimes his cronies. Many Latin American dictators have held the title of President, but wield extraordinary, often non-constitutional powers. Still other modern dictators seize power in a military coup d'état, and are supported by the military.
The dictator generally controls the three state powers : legislative, executive and judicial.
In a dictatorship, there is not periodical universal, free, direct and secret polling of the citizens to elect the leaders. Sometimes dictators can initally obtain power from democratic elections (like Adolph Hitler of Nazi Germany), but shortly after being elected the dictator will ban all opposing parties and cancel all future elections (see human rights). Though free elections will never occur under a dictatorship, sometimes dictators orchestrate phony elections in an attempt to grant themselves some illusion of democratic legitimacy and public support. Usually, the dictator runs for "re-election" unopposed, with voters being asked to answer a simple "yes or no" ballot on the leader's continued rule. As can be expected, coercion and corruption usually plague such "elections" and dictators will often claim unrealistically high voter turnouts and results. Dictator Charles King of Liberia for example once claimed to have been "re-elected" by a majority that was more than 15% larger than his country's entire electorate. Many agree that an example of a present day European dictatorship is the Belarussian state controlled by its president Aleksandr Lukashenko.
The dictator and dictatorship members are subject to national and international responsibility for their acts (see International Criminal Court).
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