Self-coup

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A self-coup or autocoup is a form of coup d'état that occurs when a country's leader dissolves the national legislature and assumes extraordinary powers not granted under normal circumstances. Other measures taken may include annulling the nation's constitution and suspending civil courts. In most cases the head of state is granted dictatorial powers.

One of the best modern examples of the self-coup is elected Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori's takeover of the government on April 5, 1992, ostensibly to exercise absolute authority in annihilating marxist Shining Path insurgents. Germany offers another example, in Adolf Hitler's infamous Enabling Act, 1933, and the process of Gleichschaltung, consolidating the power of the Nazi party (NSDAP).

A historical example was the coup d'état of Charles Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, who granted himself emergency powers and later conducted a referendum in which he became Napeoleon III.

Examples in fiction, meanwhile, include the assumption by Chancellor Palpatine of "emergency powers" (which he claimed were needed to help him deal with a crisis he had secretly engineered), and his later declaration of the Galactic Empire, in the Star Wars prequel trilogy by George Lucas.

[edit] List of self-coups

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