CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2024
| Author | Poltoratskaya, Viktoriia |
|---|---|
| Title | Factors Of Political Machines Success: Russian Case |
| Summary | Between 2000 and 2021, the political regime in Russia underwent significant transformations, presenting a compelling case for scholars of electoral authoritarianism. Elections emerged as pivotal not only for the regime and the opposition but also for the mechanism through which state resources were distributed to a select group of supporters. Such mechanisms, often referred to in academic literature as political machines or clientelistic exchanges, involve a complex web of interactions among politicians, intermediaries, and voters. While existing research on Russia provides some insights into aspects of clientelistic exchanges within the country, this dissertation seeks to offer a comprehensive analysis by examining all participants in these exchanges—their motivations, the resources at their disposal, and their dynamics across different electoral contexts within Russia. Thus, the overarching question of this study is: What does the Russian political machine look like when viewed as a unified mechanism? This research aims to identify the key actors involved, understand their motivations, and analyze how their interplay results in electoral gains for the dominant party (United Russia) and the incumbent (Vladimir Putin). This research is comprised of three papers, each focusing on different aspects of the interactions and motivations within the political machine in Russia. Each paper introduces a theoretical framework for examining these relationships, offering unique perspectives on the dynamics at play. The first paper provides game-theoretic model explaining how the party distributes benefits to voters and how this influences their electoral preferences. The second paper examines the interplay between voters' motivations, the capabilities of brokers, and the party's preferences, which culminates in suboptimal electoral outcomes for the dominant party in an authoritarian regime. The third paper delves into the rent-seeking behavior that characterizes the cooperation between business entities and the regime, providing insight into the economic underpinnings of political machine. This dissertation is organized as follows: It begins with an introduction that lays out the key definitions, summarizes the main arguments of the study, provides insight into the latest developments within the regime, and outlines potential avenues for future research on clientelism in Russia. Following this, the first paper presents findings from a nationwide survey in Russia, uncovering the respondents' preferences for different benefits and their related electoral decisions. The second paper investigates the influence of large businesses on elections through electoral mobilization strategies. It further demonstrates that although mobilization can increase voter turnout, the votes of mobilized individuals often favor the opposition. Lastly, the third paper explores the strategic collaboration between the dominant party's donors and the financial benefits they receive from the state, specifically through public procurement contracts. This research contributes to the study of authoritarian regimes and, more specifically, clientelism, by employing statistical data and advanced quantitative methodologies. It is the aspiration of this work that scholars investigating clientelism in other non-democratic contexts with scarce data availability, as well as those focusing on Russia, can leverage the techniques and data presented here to uncover the covert mechanisms of political corruption. |
| Supervisor | Dorsch, Michael |
| Department | Political Science PhD |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2024/poltoratskaya_vikt.pdf |
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