Russia’s Crony Capitalism. The Path from Market Economy to Kleptocracy

Andermo, Erik

doi:10.23865/noros.v34.2396

Cited by 7 publications

(7 citation statements)

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“…Empirical studies found little support for either proposition in Russia during the 1990s (Gerber, 2000, 2002; Gerber & Hout, 1998). In fact, Russia diverged from a textbook market economy, instead developing “crony capitalism” (Aslund, 2019), where a handful of elites used political connections to amass fortunes by acquiring the lion's share of formerly state‐owned productive assets while most of the population's living standards were eroded by falling earnings, surging inflation, shrinking employment in heavy industries (favored by Soviet‐era planners but undermined by foreign competition), and eroding social welfare payments.…”

Section: The Labor Marketmentioning

confidence: 99%

Inequality and social stratification in Russia during the Putin regime: From market transition to war on Ukraine

Gerber,

Gimpelson

2024

Sociology Compass

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The collapse of the USSR in late 1991 inspired social science research on levels, patterns, and trends in inequality within Russia, due to theoretical interest in how market transition affects social stratification. The start of the Putin regime in 2000 marked a new era in Russia's post‐Soviet political economic trajectory: in contrast to the 1990s, the economy first took off, then stagnated, while the state rolled back institutions of democracy and civic freedoms. In short, Russia became a consolidated market economy under authoritarian rule. In this context research has continued to produce insights into social stratification. The labor market featured high levels of employment but with downward wage flexibility, modest decreases in earnings inequality, and persistent returns to education, gender wage gaps, and locality‐based differences. Waves of labor migration to Russia, resurgent traditional gender norms, shrinking population, housing inequality, health disparities, and a small contingent of ultra‐rich represent additional noteworthy developments. Although market transition is no longer an intriguing theoretical lens through which to view social stratification in Russia, the topic nonetheless holds broader theoretical interest because inequality became closely intertwined with Russia's political economy, social policies, and geopolitical actions, including those that culminated in Putin's decision to invade Ukraine.

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Section: The Labor Marketmentioning

confidence: 99%

Inequality and social stratification in Russia during the Putin regime: From market transition to war on Ukraine

Gerber,

Gimpelson

2024

Sociology Compass

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“…Putin was able to build and maintain a strong regime in Russia through a combination of strategic economic policies and control over political institutions (Åslund, 2015;Jennings 2021). His government placed key sectors of the economy, such as energy and defence, under his direct control.…”

Section: Public Choice and The Context Of Russia Foreign Policy Forma...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Introducing public choice in international relations: the Russian invasion of Ukraine

Trantidis

2024

Journal of Public Finance and Public Choice

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With this article, I present a public choice perspective on Russia’s war on Ukraine. I criticise the realist view according to which Russia’s security concerns, defined by President Putin, prompted the conflict. I argue that realism offers a deficient analytic framework to the extent that it disregards the political and economic structure of Russia and, generally speaking, how the political economy of each case study shapes preferences, strategies and intra-elite relations, which feed into foreign policy formation. Russia is a government-controlled economy and society; a key property of Russia’s political economy is the dependency of key socio-economic actors and groups on the regime’s survival. This landscape pre-empts the expression of genuine feedback and dissent from society, and explains why Putin’s decision has faced very little disagreement and resistance. Given the previously close economic ties between Russia and Ukraine, this article also challenges capitalist peace theory for its blanket assertion that dense economic relations would provide a strong disincentive for countries to resort to war. Instead of talking about capitalism generically, we can discern varieties of capitalism, as they condition state–society relations differently. In Russia, the value that key socio-economic elites assign to their relationship with Putin outweighs the costs they are experiencing from the conflict and the external sanctions. Developing a public choice perspective in the study of international relations focuses on the preferences and strategies of the leadership and of domestic elite-level actors within the aggressor state, and invites attention to the power asymmetries that characterise their relationship.

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“…In 2019, Anders Aslund examined the performance of key state corporations, such as Gazprom, Vneshekonombank, and Rostec, and concluded that Russia's brand of state capitalism is not associated with "long-term state plans for investment and technological development," and that Rostec's development appears to be a reflection of its CEO empire-building ambitions rather than economic efficiency or innovation considerations. 322 In the same vein, another set of authors analyzed Russian anti-access/area denial measures and concluded that Russia's ability to produce "technical miracles" will be limited by endemic cronyism and corruption. 323 Polina Beliakova and Sam Perlo-Freeman reviewed key cases of corruption in the Russian defense sector and noted that corruption remains a "significant problem facing the Russian arms industry," citing reports that MoD's secretive procurement was contributing to corruption.…”

Section: Institutions and The Innovation Environmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Russia's Asymmetric Response to 21st Century Strategic Competition: Robotization of the Armed Forces

2023

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Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Kremlin will have to rethink, reform, and rebuild the country's military while facing even more binding financial constraints under a new wave of sanctions and export controls. In this new strategic and economic environment, Russia's political and military leadership likely will have to prioritize some modernization programs and abandon others. Some Russian military strategists have said that the country's military should not match its adversaries' capabilities; instead, it should seek an asymmetric response by developing capabilities that make its adversaries' high-tech weapon systems economically unjustifiable. In recent years, there seemed to be a growing consensus in Russia that using artificial intelligence and robotics-enabling relatively cheap but capable forces-might just be such an asymmetric response. Moreover, in the face of unsatisfactory performance and low morale of the Russian troops in Ukraine, Moscow might see the robotization of the Armed Forces as a way to alleviate its dependence on manpower. However, such a technological shift will be more difficult to achieve under these new financial and technological constraints.In this report, we examine the Russian vision for robotization and highlight where that vision diverges from the robotic revolution in the United States. We analyze Russia's progress in the robotization of its Armed Forces and assess under what conditions could Moscow deliver on its robotization vision. Our findings indicate that, compared with the United States, Russia might be more willing to grant autonomy to military drones and robots when executing strikes and appears to see ground robotic capabilities on par with aerial drones. Moscow believes that unmanned capabilities can replace soldiers (and not just augment them); this is supposed to decrease personnel losses and increase combat effectiveness. Although robotization progress has been slow and the key inputs of the innovation system will be negatively affected by the sanctions and export controls that were imposed on Russia in 2022, the overall emphasis on unmanned capabilities might persist. Consequently, lowering the political and financial costs of Russian foreign deployments could increase those deployments' frequency.The research reported here was completed in October 2021, reviewed and revised in spring 2022 on the basis of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and underwent security review with the sponsor and the Defense Office of Prepublication and Security Review before public release.

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Russia’s Crony Capitalism. The Path from Market Economy to Kleptocracy

Cited by 7 publications

References 0 publications

Inequality and social stratification in Russia during the Putin regime: From market transition to war on Ukraine

Inequality and social stratification in Russia during the Putin regime: From market transition to war on Ukraine

Introducing public choice in international relations: the Russian invasion of Ukraine

Russia's Asymmetric Response to 21st Century Strategic Competition: Robotization of the Armed Forces

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