Comparing Legitimation Strategies in Post-Soviet Countries

Soest, Christian von; Grauvogel, Julia

doi:10.1057/9781137489449_2

Cited by 17 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 62 publications

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“…Having in mind the limitations of this study, my findings have implications for understanding recent trends in democratisation in post-socialist countries. The observation that in authoritarian states upward intergenerational mobility does not lead to support for democracy is in line with recent claims that politically repressive countries may provide their citizens with greater social mobility opportunities (Leventoglu, 2014;Soest & Grauvogel, 2016). It should not be surprising then that socially mobile individuals in many post-socialist societies are less enthusiastic about democracy as the preferred form of political order.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

“…The so called 'coloured revolutions' in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan in the early 2000s generated hopes for an accelerated process of democratisation throughout the former Soviet Union, but these revolutions in fact provoked autocrats in Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Russia, and other post-Soviet countries to strengthen domestic efforts to pre-empt challenges related to democratisation processes (Silitski, 2010). The recent comparative analysis of the Regime Legitimation Expert Survey suggests that one of the mechanisms through which the authoritarian rulers in these countries maintain power is their legitimating claim that they represent the guardians of citizens' socio-economic well-being (Soest & Grauvogel, 2016). The latter relates to the main thesis of this study that support for a political regime by socially mobile individuals is conditioned by the level of attained democracy in post-socialist countries.…”

Section: Patterns Of Democratisation In Post-socialist Societiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Social origins of support for democracy: a study of intergenerational mobility

Gugushvili

2020

International Review of Sociology

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Recent evidence suggests that popular disaffection with liberaldemocratic norms and institutions has been growing in different regions of the world, but studying the social origins of democratic versus authoritarian political preferences are especially relevant in countries with immature democratic practices. The main concern of this article is the association between intergenerational social mobility and support for democracy in post-socialist societies. I present a theoretical framework in which individuals' political attitudes are affected by their intergenerational social mobility experiences. I model this theoretical argument using two complementary data-sets and various multivariable and multilevel statistical techniques. The results indicate that intergenerational social mobility, particularly its subjective perception, has statistically significant links with attitudes towards democracy and that this association is moderated by the attained level of democracy in the country where an individual resides. This may suggest that studying social origins of support for democracy by means of intergenerational social mobility can be an important tool to understand the conundrum of democratisation and democratic backsliding in post-socialist societies.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

Section: Patterns Of Democratisation In Post-socialist Societiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social origins of support for democracy: a study of intergenerational mobility

Gugushvili

2020

International Review of Sociology

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“…First, this article relates to the growing literature investigating how political authorities use various legitimation strategies to convince citizens that they are rightly in position of power (e.g., Holbig & Gilley, 2010;Mazepus et al, 2016;Von Soest & Grauvogel, 2016). We have shown how political culture and social contract theory are bound up with different notions of legitimacy and how these theories could be integrated within one framework.…”

Section: Conclusion: Stability Social Contract and Legitimation Stmentioning

confidence: 98%

State-society relations and the sources of support for the Putin regime: bridging political culture and social contract theory

Feldmann

Mazepus

2017

East European Politics

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This article evaluates two theoretical approaches to the popularity and resilience of authoritarianism in Russia, namely political culture and social contract theory. These approaches are two of the most important theories of Russian politics and also reflect the general divide in comparative and post-communist politics between political-cultural and rationalist explanations. We demonstrate that these approaches are bound up with different notions of legitimacy. This article suggests that neither framework offers a complete explanation of the Russian case. We develop an alternative framework that bridges these two approaches. Our analysis suggests that the social contract in Russia needs to be analysed as dynamic and conditional. Moreover, the use of different legitimation strategies by Russian authorities suggests that leaders can reshape the social contract and gain support in a strategic fashion by choosing appeals related to political culture.

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“…Against the background of the social contract mentioned before, economic development, and output legitimacy in general, constitute one of the main regime's claims to legitimation (Del Sordi, 2016;Kudaibergenova, 2015;von Soest & Grauvogel, 2016). Not only does the regime engage in promoting growth, development and general wellbeing; through its rhetoric, it tries to appropriate economic successes and reinforce the impression that the regime is the generous maker of such wonders (Del Sordi, 2016, pp.…”

Section: Study-abroad Programmes and The Pillars Of Authoritarian Stamentioning

confidence: 99%

Sponsoring student mobility for developmentandauthoritarian stability: Kazakhstan’s Bolashak programme

Sordi

2017

Globalizations

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Soon after independence, Kazakhstan established the state-sponsored student mobility programme 'Bolashak', which has since provided almost 12,000 young people with full scholarships for their studies abroad. Bolashak is considered here as a multidimensional tool, promoting development and channelling authoritarian rule at the same time. Through a series of qualitative interviews with alumni of the programme, this paper investigates the authoritarian and paternalistic features in Bolashak-related policies and discourses, looking at how they contribute to the three 'pillars' of authoritarian stability: repression, co-optation and legitimation. The findings of this paper question the assumption that globalization is bringing only challenges to autocracies. Kazakhstan is an example of how contemporary authoritarian regimes may open up to the world in order to seek development as well as political stability.

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Comparing Legitimation Strategies in Post-Soviet Countries

Cited by 17 publications

References 62 publications

Social origins of support for democracy: a study of intergenerational mobility

Social origins of support for democracy: a study of intergenerational mobility

State-society relations and the sources of support for the Putin regime: bridging political culture and social contract theory

Sponsoring student mobility for developmentandauthoritarian stability: Kazakhstan’s Bolashak programme

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