TY  - JOUR
TI  - The Imitation of Stateness: Predator Instead of Manager
T2  - The Russian Sociological Review
IS  - The Russian Sociological Review
KW  - political regime
KW  - Russian politics
KW  - statehood
KW  - ideology
KW  - pastiche
KW  - stability
KW  - stateness
AB  - This study examines the widespread thesis of recent years of the "strengthening" of the Russian state, perceived as improving its solvency, increasing stability, order, and strength in the period after the year 2000. These views are analyzed on the basis of scientific ideas about the state’s potential, and its order and stability. In considering the domestic case and determining the numerous circumstances preventing a solidarity with political declarations, the author makes a conclusion about the imitative nature of the achieved "political stability" and the "strengthening" allegedly occurring in recent decades. In the author’s opinion, the dynamics of economic development, internal structural contradictions and serious discursive problems determined the expansion, not the strengthening of the state system that hampered the formation of an effective and efficient decision-making system in the political process and of public policy. The author examines various options for the presence of both strengths and weaknesses in the state structure, as well as situations where it is difficult to make an unambiguous conclusion about state consistency and what the state is. The question remains whether the state is a competent management center, a disjointed set of rival institutions, or a predator which monopolizes public resources. Concerning Russian realities and discussing hypotheses about the "predatory" and "fragmented" nature of statehood based on the works of D. North, P. Evans, M. Mann, and E. Jenne, the author remarks on the main problems faced by the continuation of the previous line of political development and the public representation of the state system. These problems include the deterioration of the foreign policy situation, the serious contraction of resources available to the regime, and the divergence within the political elite.
AU  - Kirill Telin
UR  - https://sociologica.hse.ru/en/2018-17-2/221031643.html
PY  - 2018
SP  - 39-61
VL  - 17