Propaganda and Repression in Diverse Societies

Repression and information manipulation are two primary tools employed by authoritarian regimes. We draw on recent advances in the economic theory of information to examine how repression and propaganda complement each other: when the regime’s opponents face harsher repression, persuasion is more effective. When the regime can target less supportive citizens for repression, it manipulates the rest of the population more intensively. Moreover, propaganda is less effective in diverse societies; consequently, the regime has to rely more on repression and can benefit from reducing diversity. In the era of information autocrats, our model highlights the critical role of repression.