Rentier, Resource Curse, or Post-Soviet Legacy? Post-Soviet and MENA Autocracies

• In Event: Rethinking Rentierism: Global Perspectives, Changing Realities (Virtual Session)

Abstract

A debate over the nature of authoritarian practices in Post-Soviet Eurasia has emerged in comparative politics and area studies scholarship. Pointing to similar practices, such as repression and co-optation, this literature categorizes Russia and Kazakhstan as rentier states, suffering from the resource curse, and/or experiencing the legacies of generations of Soviet rule. Indeed, the theoretical expectations underpinning all three literatures predict that states will engage in repression of (potential) opposition and co-optation through the provision of common goods. Nevertheless, a closer reading of these theories reveals differing causes of repression and co-optation that should be empirically observable. This paper engages in a structured focused comparison of seven countries that vary on key components, such as natural resource extraction, types of rent (resource rents, military aid, and remittances), and whether they were part of the Soviet Union to de-tangle the role that resource rents, rentierism, and Soviet legacies play in the prevalence and modes of repression and co-optation. In addition to comparing post-Soviet states, such as Kazakhstan, Georgia, Russia, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan, we also include countries that were not part of the Soviet Union, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. By using MENA autocracies as the comparative referent, rather than Western Europe, we are able to better categorize and explain the practices of social control observed in post-Soviet Eurasia.

Authors

• Allison D. Evans, University of Nevada, Reno

• Ian M. Hartshorn, University of Nevada, Reno