COVID, Contagion & Contestation: Longitudinal Evidence from Russia

• In Event: Shaping Public Opinion in Electoral Authoritarian Russia

Abstract

Why does hardship cause some citizens to abandon an autocrat, and others to rally? While theories of authoritarianism tend to pin the durability of non-democratic regimes on a combination of elite coordination, institutionalization, and material-rational mass behavior, increasing attention is being paid to the non-material factors of autocratic legitimation, and in particular to psychological and social factors more commonly studied in democracies. Recent research on Russia in particular has helped to elucidate the social and social-psychological pathways through which state and society come together to “co-construct” authoritarian power. This paper mobilizes a panel survey conducted in August 2019 and August 2020 in Russia, bracketing both the controversial revision of the country’s constitution and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, in order to distinguish between three key factors shaping shifts in support for an authoritarian leader: entrenched opinion, material hardship, and emotion. The evidence suggests that the experience of hardship can shift political views, but the road from hardship to politics runs through emotion, while emotional responses are strongly determined by media choice.

Author

• Samuel A. Greene, King's College London