You are invited to join the weekly Nuremberg Research Seminar in Economics on 8 July 2026, from 13.15 to 14.45 pm. The seminar will be held in room LG 0.423. Nicola Fontana (Trinity College Dublin) will be talking about “When the Dictator is in Town” (joint with F. Barilari and N. Mastrorocco).
More information can be found here:
Do dictators need aligned bureaucrats? We examine the impact of exposure to the autocratic leader on one key tool at dictatorships’ disposal to maintain power: repression. Focusing on Italy’s Fascist dictatorship (1926-1939), the paper utilizes newly gathered data on visits by Mussolini. Using the temporal and geographical variation of these visits in a staggered difference-in-differences framework, we show that a visit by Mussolini significantly increased repression. The results suggest a top-down mechanism, driven by increased policing and allocation of bureaucrats aligned with the regime’s goals.