"Dictatorships and Double Standards" is an essay by Jeane Kirkpatrick, published in the November 1979 issue of Commentary Magazine, which criticized the foreign policy of the Carter administration. It is also the title of a 270 page book written by Kirkpatrick in 1982. The essay compares traditional autocracies and Communist regimes: Kirkpatrick concluded that while the United States should encourage liberalization and democracy in autocratic countries, it should not do so when the government is facing violent overthrow, and should expect gradual change rather than immediate transformation.