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Paper short abstract

Anti-system leaders like Trump practice anti-policy in three meanings. Grounded in personalized power and indifference to law, their governance regimes recall communist and Putinesque power structures, i.e., “patronal politics”—politics that are unstable internally and foment instability externally.

Paper long abstract

“Anti-policy”—decisionmakers systematically flouting the processes and norms of their liberal democracy—is widely practiced today. In this second meaning (panel Abstract), anti-policy is the standard practice of anti-system leaders when they come to power. President Trump embodies such anti-policy: Politics always trump policy (pun intended).

How to make sense of the governance regimes dominated by anti-policy in this meaning? Viewing Trump’s and other such leaders’ actions through the lens of liberal governance norms is a non-starter; A different playbook guides them.

Using examples from Trump’s presidency, we argue:

• Anti-policy/anti-system governance regimes recall communist and Putinesque power structures, i.e., “patronal politics” that “[revolve] chiefly around personalized relations” (Henry Hale, 2015). Trump reigns through capricious, personalized power, and indifference to law reminiscent of Vladimir Putin. Trump’s goal of dismantling the “system” through operations like DOGE is achieved through setups characteristic of communistic practice.

• This kind of anti-policy invites the deployment of anti-policy in another meaning: policies that counteract something (e.g., anti-system, anti-narcotics trafficking) (first meaning, panel Abstract).

• Anti-policy in both above meanings incorporates what appears, from the vantagepoint of liberal democratic governance, to be arbitrary or incoherent decisions and enforcement thereof (third meaning, panel Abstract). Trump’s anti-drug policy seems incoherent from a liberal democratic perspective, as his administration both bombed Venezuelan boats allegedly smuggling drugs and pardoned a major convicted drug trafficker. Yet this approach aligns with Trump’s personalized, patronal politics.

• Patronal politics, grounded in informal power, are inherently unstable internally and foment instability externally, i.e., in foreign relations.