Irina Busygina

The Calculus of Non-Protest in Russia: Redistributive Expectations from Political Reforms

THE PUZZLE THAT WE ADDRESS IN THIS ESSAY IS THE EXTREME unevenness in the way the Russian public protests against authoritarianism and demands political reforms. Between 2000 and 2013 there were numerous local protests demanding specific actions by municipal or regional officials (for example, to prevent local factory bankruptcy, to stop construction, and to expel migrants). There were also protests demanding better public goods and services such as education, healthcare, and transport, to stop welfare reforms, or against the reorganisation of scientific funding. However, when it comes to protests concerning demands for political reforms such as free and fair elections, the protection of human rights, and for institutionalised democracy, most of the activity was limited toMoscow and other very large cities (Robinson 2013). Elsewhere, the scope of pro-democracy action remained much more limited. A 2012 opinion poll by the Levada Centre has shown that only around 20% of Russians (mostly residents of the largest cities) support the idea of in-depth political reforms, leaving the remaining 80% either against democratic reforms or indifferent to the idea. Furthermore, based on demographic covariates, Levada Centre analysts forecast that this 20– 80 breakdown on the issue is set to persist for the foreseeable future. In this study we provide a theoretical explanation to account for the fact that prodemocracy protests, support for political and institutional reforms, and electoral support for opposition parties are not spreading in modern-day Russia, and remain limited to specific social groups and large cities. The explanation, we argue, lies in citizens’ concerns over the highly uncertain redistributive consequences of political reforms. Our theoretical framework links high levels of economic inequality with difficulties of democratic consolidation and society’s inability to reach a consensus on how to address the lingering institutional inefficiency. See ‘Levada–tsentr o nastroeniyakh rossiyan’, available at: http://anpravo.ru/index.php/mnu-news/mnuobshestvo/121-levada-tsentr-o-nastroeniyakh-rossiyan, accessed 11 December 2014. While other important considerations lie in informational, organisational, and collective action problems of protests or opposition movements across Russia as well as the specifics of non-democratic politics at the sub-national level, we do not address these, instead referring the reader to the existing work on the subject (Gel’man & Ross 2010). Our focus is on the configuration of economic incentives to support democratic political reforms. EUROPE-ASIA STUDIES Vol. 67, No. 2, March 2015, 209–223

Critical infrastructure protection and Russia's hybrid regime

The Russian policy on critical infrastructure protection was outlined in the early 2000s and has been consolidated in recent years as a part of the national security strategy. This policy is evolving against a background composed of an uneasy combination of factors: the degeneration of infrastructures critical for the countrys economic and social development, and the de-legitimization of political institutions responsible for protecting ‘population’ and ‘territory’. The recent major catastrophes in Russia, the notorious forest fires in 2010 in particular, have become examples of political events that offer a point of reference for the current regimes failure to uphold its promises of ‘order and stability’.

A coalition within a coalition: the Baltics in the European Union

This article gives an overview of small power problem focusing on the behaviour of small power states within coalitions and their proneness to free riding. To pursue an independent agenda and increase their significance within large associations, the authors argue, small powers tend to create ‘coalitions within coalitions’, essentially acting as free riders and transferring costs and political responsibility for decisionmaking to larger players. Such an asymmetric strategy makes it possible for small powers to advance their interests within alliances and save resources. The authors test this hypothesis on the behaviour of the Baltics in the European Union. It is demonstrated that Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia have created a stable small coalition within the EU and actively form ad hoc alliances with the leading states to push union-level decisions, as it was the case with settling the migrant issue. In other areas, these states tend to benefit from free-riding behaviour.

Low Quality of National Governance and Uneven Economic Competiveness of the Russian Regions

Most scholars agree that strong institutions and better governance are instrumental for success in the global economy. However some political regimes fail to improve governance but attract significant volume of foreign direct investments and demonstrate high rates of economic growth. We argue that when quality of national governance low, investments and economic growth are likely to be associated with significant regional differentiation. Low quality of national governance is a serious obstacle to competiveness but it could be compensated by locally unique comparative advantages. We illustrate the argument focusing on the Russian experience with highly unequal distribution of regional economic competiveness.

Benefits and Risks of Political Modernization in Russia

A government-proclaimed desire to promote technological innovation and boost economic growth in Russia implies the need for the state to take an active role in the economy and to provide the right stimuli and guarantees for investors. Since under its current political regime the Russian state lacks trust and credibility, and since the actions of the state to promote innovative economic development as well as its likelihood of succeeding depend on its type and characteristics, such an economic agenda would demand democratization. For entrepreneurs and investors, in its current form the Russian state is inefficient, riddled with corruption, lacking in accountability, and unpredictable. Most importantly, it cannot credibly commit to respect property rights and sustain the rules with which they are associated. Democratic reforms, ideally, could modernize the Russian state and make it simultaneously strong, limited, accountable, conducive to good governance and, thus, an effective agent of economic modernization. Yet the same Russian leadership that proclaims the vital importance of economic and technological innovation is reluctant to engage in political modernization, attempting instead to improve the existing model of governance by administrative methods.

A Germany of States and a Russia of Regions

Regionalism is timely once again; today it is regarded as a counterweight to any kind of monotony or uniformity. It is a response to the leveling tendencies of the center, whether this is a nation-state or a supranational organization—for example, the European Union. Identity, regional identity included, is becoming a key factor in the debates about modern civil society, many elements of which coincide with views of regionalism. Contemporary regionalism is hence intelligible only and exclusively in connection with civil society.