With global attention on Venezuela following the U.S. removal of Nicolás Maduro, one of the central questions is whether taking out a leader actually changes the political system that put him in power.
Two University of Rochester political scientists — Hein Goemans and Gretchen Helmke — study different sides of this issue, and can shed light on why authoritarian regimes often survive even when leaders fall and what the U.S. intervention means for Venezuela and the world order.
Goemans specializes in how wars begin and end, regime survival, and why so-called “decapitation strategies” — removing a leader without dismantling the broader power structure — so often fail to produce stable outcomes. His research draws on cases ranging from Iraq and Afghanistan to authoritarian regimes in Latin America.
In a recent interview with WXXI Public Media, Goemans warned that removing Maduro does not resolve the underlying system of military and economic control that sustained his rule. Without changes to those institutions, he said, power is likely to remain concentrated among the same elite networks.
“The problem isn’t just the leader,” Goemans explained. “It’s the structure that rewards loyalty and punishes defection. If that remains intact, the politics don’t fundamentally change.”
Helmke, a leading scholar of democracy and authoritarianism in Latin America, emphasizes that legitimacy, not just force, determines whether democratic transitions take hold.
Her research helps explain why democratic breakthroughs so often stall after moments of dramatic change, and why outside interventions can unintentionally weaken domestic opposition movements by shifting power toward regime insiders.
“When the institutions and elites remain in place, uncertainty — not democratic transition — often becomes the dominant political reality,” she said.
For journalists covering the fast-moving situation, Goemans and Helmke are available to discuss why removing leaders rarely brings the political transformation policymakers expect and what history suggests comes next. They can address:
• Why regime-change operations so often backfire, even when dictators are deeply unpopular
• What sidelining democratic opposition means for legitimacy
• Whether U.S. claims that Maduro is illegitimate hold up under international and U.S. law
• How prosecuting a foreign leader in U.S. courts could reshape norms of sovereignty
• The risks the U.S. intervention poses to the rules-based international order and NATO
• How interventions affect international norms, including sovereignty and the rule of law, and why short-term tactical successes can create long-term strategic risks.
• Why treating global politics as a series of “one-off” power plays misunderstands how states actually enforce norms over time
• How competing factions inside the U.S. administration may be driving incoherent foreign policy
Geomans also brings rare insight into the internal dynamics of U.S. policymaking, having taught and observed Stephen Miller, one of President Donald Trump’s closest aides who is helping shape the administration’s worldview. (Goemans taught Miller at Duke University in 2003.)
Click on the profiles for Goemans and Helmke to connect with them.
