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PONARS Eurasia
PONARS Eurasia
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RECOMMENDED
  • Putin’s Rules of the Game: The Pitfalls of Russia’s New Constitution

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  • In the Caucasus, There Is a Peace Agreement but Not Peace

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  • Russia’s Niche Soft Power: Sources, Targets and Channels of Influence

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  • A Weak Link in NATO? Bulgaria, Russia, and the Lure of Espionage

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  • Russia’s Weak Strongman: The Perilous Bargains That Keep Putin in Power

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RSS PONARS Eurasia Podcast
  • Music and Politics in Contemporary Russia [Lipman Series 2021] April 12, 2021
    In this week's PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Maria Lipman chats with Alexander Gorbachev about the dynamic music scene in contemporary Russia, and how free Russian musicians are to make political statements.
  • How is the Russian Government Coping with Rising Food Prices? [Lipman Series 2021] March 15, 2021
    In this week's PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Maria Lipman chats with Anton Tabakh about rising food prices in Russia, and what they might mean for Russia's current and future stability.
  • The Communist Party of the Russian Federation: More Than Just Systemic Opposition? [Lipman Series 2021] March 5, 2021
    In this week's episode of the PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Maria Lipman chats with Felix Light and Nikolay Petrov about the contemporary Communist Party of the Russian Federation, including the divisions between its leadership and membership, its attitude toward Alexei Navalny, and why it might be more than just "systemic" opposition after all.
  • Internet Resources: Civic Communication and State Surveillance [Lipman Series 2021] February 16, 2021
    In this week's PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Maria Lipman chats with Andrei Soldatov and Tanya Lokot about the role of the internet in contemporary Russian politics, including both as a tool of the Russian opposition and as an instrument of the increasingly repressive Russian regime.
  • The Rise of Alexei Navalny's Political Stature and Mass Protest in Russia [Lipman Series 2021] February 1, 2021
    In the first PONARS Eurasia Podcast of 2021, Maria Lipman chats with Greg Yudin about the current protests taking place in Russia, and what Alexei Navalny's growing popular support means for the Putin regime.
  • Russian Social Policy in the COVID-19 Era [Lipman Series 2020] December 21, 2020
    In 2020’s final episode of the PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Maria Lipman chats with Sarah Wilson Sokhey and Ella Paneyakh to discuss Russian social policy in the COVID-19 era, and public perception of Russia’s overall pandemic response.
  • Conscious Parenting Practices in Contemporary Russia [Lipman Series 2020] December 10, 2020
    In this week's episode of the PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Maria Lipman chats with Julia Yuzbasheva and Maria Danilova to learn more about the proliferation of "conscious parenting" practices in contemporary Russian society.
  • The Transformation of Belarussian Society [Lipman Series 2020] November 11, 2020
    In this episode of the PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Masha Lipman chats with Grigory Ioffe about the long-term and short-term factors that led up to the current protests in Belarus, and the ongoing transformation of Belarussian society.
  • Russian Lawmakers Adjust National Legislation to the Revised Constitutional Framework [Lipman Series 2020] October 26, 2020
    In this week’s PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Maria Lipman chats with Ben Noble and Nikolay Petrov about ongoing changes to Russia’s national legislation based on the recently revised constitutional framework, and what these changes portend for the 2021 Duma election.
  • Russia's Regional Elections [Lipman Series 2020] September 25, 2020
    In this week’s PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Maria Lipman chats with Graeme Robertson and Konstantin Gaaze about Russia’s September 13 regional elections and whether or not the Kremlin should be worried about upcoming Duma elections.
  • Commentary | Комментарии

Big Lessons About the Global Economy Emerge at ASEEES

  • November 22, 2017
  • Sarah Wilson Sokhey

What can post-communist Europe teach us about the global economy? A lot, as revealed by research presented at the recent annual ASEEES conference in Chicago. First, businesspeople who win elected office do govern differently though not necessarily in the ways they promise. David Szakonyi presented research on businesspeople candidates in Russia indicating that businesspeople candidates do indeed govern differently. Using a regression discontinuity research design with data from municipal and regional elections in Russia, he shows that businesspeople candidate who win office do not reduce the size of government. Instead, they tend to cut spending on some government agencies in favor of spending on things like roads and reduce corporate taxes while leaving spending on healthcare and education mostly the same. He concludes that despite their campaign promises, businesspeople tend to make government run, “for a business rather than like a business.”

Szakonyi’s research offers broader insight into the role of businesspeople in politics. The research he presented draws on his dissertation ("Renting Elected Office: Why Businesspeople Become Politicians in Russia"), which won the Robert C. Tucker and Stephen F. Cohen Dissertation Award from ASEEES and is the basis of his current book project. It includes an impressive original dataset beginning with 41,471 candidates to 83 regional legislatures from 2004-2012 from which 7,0000 businessperson candidates were matched with 11,000 firms using a Python algorithm to mine a database of firm registration; this was complemented with firm and sectoral level data from publicly available sources. The result is an unprecedented source of rich data that lends insight into why businesspeople run, how they govern, and their political influence.

Second, businesspeople can exploit global ties to their advantage. In her book project, When Big Business Goes Global, but Plays Local: Capital Mobility, Business and Politics in Eurasia, Inna Melnykovska explores a different facet of businesspeople’s influence on politics. She examines how Ukrainian oligarchs integrated into the global finance community and how their capital mobility affects their political and economic behavior which, in turn, affects the political and economic system that emerged in their home country. Her research highlights the abuse of financial globalization and the importance of checking those abuses. This finding is especially important given the aftermath of the 2008 and 2009 financial recession and ongoing question about corporate and bank regulation around the world.

Finally, Michael Rochlitz showed how businesspeople can exploit political connections by invoking an affiliation with the party of power. Rochlitz conducted an experiment in which different version of an email were sent to regional legislators asking for information about local programs to promote business investment. He varied both the company’s country or origin and whether there was an affiliation with United Russia. Those with United Russia ties proved to get more response. Interestingly, just the appearance of a possible affiliation with United Russia was enough to gain favoritism. Again, the post-communist context lends insight into business-state relations in an authoritarian setting.

All of these findings have important implications for understanding how businesspeople influence politics around the world: businesspeople run for office in many contexts, they often exploit international ties, and they invoke political affiliations to curry favor. Furthermore, the research presented at ASEEES offers us a more rigorous, systematic, and nuanced understanding of how and why businesspeople operate using informative case studies, original datasets, and novel experiments. The international community would be wise to pay attention.

 

Sarah Wilson Sokhey
Sarah Wilson Sokhey
Website | + posts
Assistant Professor
Affiliation

University of Colorado Boulder
Links

University of Colorado Boulder (Bio)
Expertise

Business-State Relations, Comparative Politics, Economic Reform, Pension Reform, Social Policy, Central Asia, Russia
  • Sarah Wilson Sokhey
    https://www.ponarseurasia.org/members/sarah-wilson-sokhey/
    COVID-19 in Russia: What Russians Expected, What They Got, and What They Think About It
  • Sarah Wilson Sokhey
    https://www.ponarseurasia.org/members/sarah-wilson-sokhey/
    Social Policy in Putin’s (Last?) Term
  • Sarah Wilson Sokhey
    https://www.ponarseurasia.org/members/sarah-wilson-sokhey/
    The Political Economy of Pension Policy Reversal in Post-Communist Countries
  • Sarah Wilson Sokhey
    https://www.ponarseurasia.org/members/sarah-wilson-sokhey/
    Social Policy & Regime Type
Related Topics
  • ASEEES
  • Russia
  • Sokhey
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Understanding Authoritarian Politics: Insights from ASEEES

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  • Sarah Wilson Sokhey
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