Political dynasties in the age of democracy: A bibliometric study of global research patterns and future directions

• Published in: Social sciences & humanities open Vol. 12; p. 101735
• Main Authors: Abdurahman, Ade Irfan, Shinta Dewi, Evie Ariadne, Rizal, Edwin, Rahmat, Agus
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier Ltd 2025; Elsevier
• Subjects: Bibliometric; Biblioshiny; Democracy; Political dynasty; VOSviewer; Democracy; Political dynasty; Bibliometric; Biblioshiny; VOSviewer
• ISSN: 2590-2911; 2590-2911
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ssaho.2025.101735

The study intends to investigate and evaluate the trends of political dynasties in democratic systems. Publication trends, citations, contributions of sources, authors, nations, and institutions are evaluated using a bibliometric approach. 266 relevant documents from 2000 to 2025 were generated from the Scopus database, with a clear increasing tendency in the publications of political dynasties between 2016 and 2023. The most relevant sources on this subject were found in several studies published in the Asian Journal of Comparative Politics, South East Asia Research, Asian Survey, Philippine Political Science Journal, and Studies in Indian Politics. Ernesto Dal Bó, Pedro Dal Bó, and Jason Snyder became the most often cited authors with the article titled Political dynasties. While Ronald U. Mendoza became the most productive author. Globally speaking, the nations with the most political dynasties publications in democracy are the Philippines, the United States, and Indonesia. This paper aims to explain the growth of scientific research on this topic and understand the changes in the concept of political dynasties. This study is expected to assist researchers in determining the direction of additional research, finding suitable publication possibilities, and promoting academic cooperation to enrich the study of the dynamics of political dynasties in democratic systems by spotting important trends and understudied research areas.