Puppet state

A puppet government or puppet régime is a derogatory term for a government in charge of a region or country, but only through being installed, supported and controlled by a more powerful entity, typically a foreign power. Also usually implied is the government's lack of democratic legitimacy and accountability.

The term is partisan, used almost exclusively by detractors of such governments, whether or not the majority of citizens affected acknowledge the characterization, or object to that kind of government. Examples of governments often labelled "puppet governments" include:

• the Vichy France government led by Marshall Pétain, controlled by Nazi Germany;
• Manchukuo, which refers to the nominally independent state set up in Manchuria by Japan in the 1930s; and
• most of the governments behind the Iron Curtain, controlled until 1989 by the Soviet Union.

Governments which take power after foreign military intervention, or the threat thereof, are often accused by their opponents of being puppet governments, for example the government of Hamid Karzai in post-Taliban Afghanistan, supposedly controlled by the USA. Indeed, such accusations are commonly used to destabilize governments, encouraging and justifing coup d'états, especially in Africa and Latin America.