The Costs of Regime Survival: Racial Mobilization, Elite Domination and Control of the State in Guyana and Trinidad (American Sociological Association Rose Monographs)

This comparative study of two republics examines the conditions that determine regime survival in less developed countries. The author looks at the functioning of political élites and the strategies employed, such as ethnic mobilization, patronage and coercion, to gain and maintain control of the state. He argues that political and economic development can only be adequately advanced by the resolution of the conflict between regime survival and the satisfaction of collective needs. If these collective needs are met, equitable mass participation in the domestic political process must be guaranteed.

This comparative study of two republics - Guyana in South America, and Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean - examines the conditions which determine regime survival in less developed countries. Political survival can very often depend on a leader's willingness to serve the interests of a small, but politically strategic minority. In both Guyana and Trinidad, post-independence leaders made politically expedient decisions resulting in a series of political and economic crises.