This map illustrates successful coups d’etat which occurred 1946-2012, using data from the Polity IV project, produced by the Center for Systemic Peace.
Hitting play will animate the map, showing coups in red.
For coup year and country name, click the red countries.
The data on coups are from the Polity IV project, produced by the Center for Systemic Peace. The 2013 codebook defines a coup d’etat as “a forceful seizure of executive authority and office by a dissident/opposition faction within the country’s ruling or political elites that results in a substantial change in the executive leadership and the policies of the prior regime,” and in a successful coup “authority must be exercised by new executive for at least one month” (2013, p. 1). On the map, for the year a coup occurred, a country is highlighted. This does not indicate the length of the resulting regime, seeking instead to visualize frequency.Data compiled by Adam Lauretig.