Editing Secret police (section)

==Control==

A single secret service may pose a potential threat to the central political authority. Political scientist [[Sheena Chestnut Greitens]] writes that: <blockquote>When it comes to their security forces, [[autocracy|autocrats]] face a fundamental 'coercing dilemma' between empowerment and control. ... Autocrats must empower their security forces with enough coercing capacity to enforce internal order and conduct external defense. Equally important to their survival, however, they must control that capacity, to ensure it is not turned against them.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book|last=Greitens|first=Sheena Chestnut|title=Dictators and their Secret Police: Coercive Institutions and State Violence|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=2016|pages=23–25}}</ref> </blockquote>Authoritarian regimes therefore attempt to engage in "coup-proofing" (designing institutions to minimize risks of a [[Coup d'état|coup]]). Two methods of doing so are:
* Increasing fragmentation (i.e., dividing powers among the regime security apparatuses to prevent "any single agency from amassing enough political power to carry out a coup") and
* Increasing exclusivity (i.e., purging the regime security apparatus to favor familial, social, ethnic, religious, and tribal groups perceived as more loyal).<ref name=":1" />