Authoritarian Versus Democratic Diffusions: Explaining Institutional Choices in Russia's Local Government

Federalism, gubernatorial power and the incorporation of subnational authoritarianism in Russia: A theory-testing empirical inquiry

“…The reason for the choice of these particular environmental controls is that they feature most prominently in the analyses of Russia's regional politics. Several other possible control variables, ranging from different measures of economic development (Gel'man and Lankina, 2008) to political indicators (Libman and Obydenkova, 2014a, b), were tried but did not alter the results of our analysis. The corresponding results are not reported for the sake of brevity.…”

“…A more nuanced vision of the interplay between the ongoing authoritarian turn and federal dynamics has been exposed in a number of publications that analyze in-depth the structures of incentives in Russia's regional and local politics (Gel'man, 2003(Gel'man, , 2009Gel'man and Lankina, 2008;Sharafutdinova, 2010;Gel'man and Ryzhenkov, 2011). Golosov (2011a, b) builds on these analyses when proposing a model of Russia's authoritarian transformation that includes the incorporation of subnational authoritarianism as an intrinsic -perhaps, even crucial -component in the formation of a national dictatorial political order.…”

Local Regimes, Sub-national Governance and the ‘Power Vertical’ in Contemporary Russia

“…The institutions and actors of Russia's local regimes as well as the patterns of local governance were greatly influenced by the major political and institutional changes of the 2000s. These changes included the shift from local autonomy to the partial re-establishment of a hierarchical model of regional and urban governance (the 'power vertical') (Sharafutdinova 2010a); the major decay, if not the total elimination of electoral contestation in local as 450 VLADIMIR GEL'MAN & SERGEI RYZHENKOV well as in national politics (Golosov 2008); and the abolition of popular elections of regional governors and, in many cases, of city mayors (Gel'man & Lankina 2008). How do local regimes in Russia's regions and cities function under the conditions of the 'power vertical' and sub-national authoritarianism while experiencing uncertain economic prospects?…”

Authoritarian and Democratic Diffusion in Post-Communist Regions

“…For instance, in-depth research has been conducted into how the Kremlin under Putin's rule undermined sub-national proto-democratic institutions and electoral competition (Golosov, 2011;Panov & Ross, 2013;Reddaway & Orttung, 2005a;Reuter & Remington, 2009); and how it has tended to reward regional elites for delivering a pro-Kremlin vote rather than for good governance or economic performance (Reuter & Buckley, 2015;Reuter & Robertson, 2012;Rochlitz, 2014). Scholars have also analyzed how regional authorities tend to emulate the practices of neighboring regions in ways that may further erode democratic institutions (Gel'man & Lankina, 2008;Moraski & Reisinger, 2014). We concur that longerterm structural variations and the more contingent factors like center-regional elite and partypolitical dynamics have an important bearing on political regime variations in Russia's regions.…”

“…Furthermore, the theoretical and empirical treatments of authoritarian diffusion in Europe and Eurasia have overwhelmingly focused on just two autocracies-Russia and China-as active agents of authoritarian diffusion or democratic resistance (Allison, 2013;Finkel & Brudny, 2012b;Koesel & Bunce, 2013;Plantan, 2014;Silitski, 2009;Wilson & Popescu, 2009;Wilson, 2009). Authoritarian diffusion is seen as a one-way process (but see Gel'man and Lankina 2008) whereby the more powerful autocrats like Russia or China undermine democracy or reinforce authoritarian practices through exercising economic or other forms of leverage in weaker neighborhood states or simply by having a "prestige" effect whereby lesser powers are likely to emulate their policies, institutions, and practices (Ambrosio, 2008;Cameron & Orenstein, 2012;Fordham & Asal, 2007;Wilson & Popescu, 2009). Yet, a near-exclusive focus on Russia or China as regional authoritarian states shaping patterns of authoritarian diffusion obscures the importance of lesser autocracies.…”