Demokratizatsiya最新文献

{"title":"At a Dead End: Russian Policy and the Russian Far East","authors":"Stephen J. Blank","doi":"10.3200/DEMO.17.2.122-144","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3200/DEMO.17.2.122-144","url":null,"abstract":"Contemporary Russian foreign policy is aggressive, belligerent, offensive, and swaggering. Official statements reflect the now-popular elite view that Russia is up, America is down, and Europe counts for little or nothing because of its disarray. Russia's statesmen and analysts are also prone to this tendency to make inflated claims of Russia as an Asian power. For example, in 2008, Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov claimed that because Russian consumers are buying more Japanese cars, many of which are made in (European) Russia, Russia \"makes for the prosperity of Asia, and in particular, Japan with its entire potential.\" Lavrov also stated that the plan to hold the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting in Vladivostok in 2012 and Russia's growing involvement in Asian economic and political processes proves that \"Russia's integration into the [Asia-Pacific Region] has become a fait accompli.\"1 Similarly, the veteran foreign policy analyst Viktor Kremenyuk writes that the revival of Russian power is making it an increasingly serious competitor to the United States. He charges that Russia is \"successfully crowding out the United States from its position as China's No. 1 partner, and over time could become that country's quasi-ally.\"2It would be difficult to account for such grandiose delusions without understanding Russian elites' long-standing habit of making inflated claims about Russia to compensate for or conceal the weakness and disarray that they often perceive at home. However, when we examine Russian policy in Asia, and particularly the state of its far eastern provinces, whose effective development is essential for success in Asia, Moscow's tone changes. This may well reflect the differing audiences involved: in statements concerning Russian policy in Asia, Moscow and Russian elites are speaking to the local and central government elites directly responsible for making and implementing policy, whereas the aforementioned belligerent statements are targeted at different audiences; the swaggering tone is aimed to induce recognition of Russia's strength and power. This tone is intended for an audience of foreign elites that Russia wants to influence and the domestic public, whom the government wants to convince of its stalwart defense of Russia's great-power status. In this respect, statements about Russian foreign policy seek to convince audiences at home (both elite and popular) and abroad that Russia really is the great global power that its leaders want and imagine it to be. Thus, rhetoric about Russian foreign policy in Europe and Asia is very much an identity project.3However, in the Russian Far East (RFE), the reality continues to fall short of the ideal, and Russian authorities therefore feel compelled to admit the gap between the real and desired outcomes and to frighten domestic audiences for the purpose of energizing them in pursuit of that great-power status. For that reason, policy-relevant remarks that are d","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"16 1","pages":"122-144"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82355500","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"President Medvedev and the Contested Constitutional Underpinnings of Russia's Power Vertical","authors":"W. Pomeranz","doi":"10.3200/DEMO.17.2.179-192","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3200/DEMO.17.2.179-192","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract: The author investigates Russian federalism and the constitutional underpinnings of the power vertical, looking specifically at the Constitutional Court's December 2005 case about the appointment of governors. The court's decision upheld the constitutional notion of a \"unified system of executive power\" as the primary legal justification for the power vertical. However, not all of the justices agreed with this reading of the Russian constitution, and the dissenting special opinions provide alternative interpretations of the Russian constitution's division of power. The author also analyzes President Dmitry Medvedev's November 2008 state of the nation address and Medvedev's unexpected call to reexamine and clarify the Russian constitution's requirement for a unified system of executive power. Keywords: constitution, elections, federalism, governors, power vertical ********** In his November 2008 state of the nation address, Russian president Dmitry Medvedev boldly extolled the virtues of the Russian constitution. According to Medvedev, the Russian constitution \"upholds freedom and justice, human dignity and welfare, protection of family and Fatherland, and unity of our multiethnic people--not just as common values but as legal concepts.\" (1) However, despite this effusive praise, during the speech Medvedev also announced his openness to certain \"corrections\" to the constitution. Most notable, Medvedev called for increasing the terms of the Russian president and Duma representatives to six years and five years, respectively, an amendment that was swiftly enacted into law. Medvedev raised the specter of less flashy but more fundamental legal reforms as well. Interestingly, in his inaugural address to the nation, Medvedev chose to revisit several pillars of the so-called power vertical, the term generally used to describe Putin's highly centralized, Kremlin-controlled political system. Medvedev expressly called for a modification in the gubernatorial selection process, proposing that potential nominees should come from those parties that received the highest number of votes in the regional elections. Medvedev also raised Article 77 of the Russian constitution, one of the provisions that define the construction of Russia's federal structures. This article consists of two parts: Article 77.1 states that, subject to certain constitutional limitations, individual regions should be allowed to establish their own institutions of state power independently; Article 77.2 calls for a \"unified system of executive power\" over the subjects of the Russian Federation. (2) Medvedev specifically highlighted Article 77.2 in his state of the nation address and the need to clarify this provision's mandate for integrating Russia's federal and regional structures into a single system. From a constitutional standpoint, although Article 77.2 currently serves as the cornerstone of the power vertical, this provision remains one of the most ambiguous and unexplored cl","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"42 1","pages":"179-192"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82594516","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Father Aleksandr Men and the Struggle to Recover Russia's Heritage","authors":"W. Daniel","doi":"10.3200/DEMO.17.1.73-92","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3200/DEMO.17.1.73-92","url":null,"abstract":"The Centre of Religious Literature and Russian Publications Abroad in the M. I. Rudomino All-Russian State Library for Foreign Literature in Moscow presents a sharp contrast to the aggressive, inward-looking, and nationalistic groups that view the Orthodox Church as a key part of Russia's national recovery. Consecrated by Patriarch Aleksi II, the center includes a room honoring Father Aleksandr Men, one of Russia's leading priests and pastors, whose murder in September 1990 marked a turning point in Russian history. Men's death, unresolved to the present day, reminded his followers of the violence often inflicted on Russia's greatest prophetic minds. Yet the murder also stiffened the resolve of those who venerated Men's accomplishments and his teachings. The room in Men's honor communicates his persistent efforts to learn from other religions. The books and key texts of those other faiths, the green plants that bring the natural world inside, and the skilled and dedicated library staff (who seem to consider their service here an honored task) suggest Men's openness to the world.1 The large number of students, scholars, and foreign visitors who come to this place to do research experience a part of Russia that reaches beyond the nation's boundaries to other cultures and religious traditions.The Library for Foreign Literature was founded in 1921 by Margarita Ivanovna Rudomino, a twenty-year-old woman who preserved a collection of French, German, and English books, brought from her late mother's estate in Saratov, in a run-down apartment in the Arbat district of Moscow. Writer Kornei Chukovsky recalls that this modest library existed in \"a small, cold, and dark room crammed full of books. The books were frozen stiff. An emaciated, shivering girl whose fingers were swollen with the cold watched over them.\"2 During a time when Russia became increasingly isolated in the international community, Rudomino believed that it must not lose its cultural connections: its capacity to hear the humanitarian voices that reach beyond politics.3Openness to foreign voices, however, led to constant tension with the Soviet state, which is reflected in the location of the library. \"We are something of an anomaly,\" said Yekaterina Genieva, the library's distinguished director-general. In most countries, \"foreign literature is integrated in other library collections. In the Soviet Union, it was set apart, housed in a different place.\"4 However, that separateness makes the library special. The library's unique role is evident everywhere: in the marble busts in the courtyard, the art exhibits on the walls of nearly every floor, the colorful displays of children's literature, the audio facilities of the BBC, and the American reading room. But most striking is the large room dedicated to Men on the fourth and top floor of the library, facing away from the Kremlin and testifying to the important connection between books and learning, memory, and wisdom. Men demonstrated this c","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"120 1","pages":"73-92"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82216017","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Russian Babies, Russian Babes: Economic and Demographic Implications of International Adoption and International Trafficking for Russia","authors":"J. McKinney","doi":"10.3200/DEMO.17.1.19-40","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3200/DEMO.17.1.19-40","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract: In this article, the author examines Russian attitudes and policies toward international adoption and human trafficking--two trends not regularly addressed in discussions of the demographic problems facing Russia. The author argues that differences in the way the two kinds of outflows are treated are not appropriate given their economic and demographic consequences. Keywords: demographic crisis, human trafficking, international adoption, women in Russia ********** Russia faces a demographic crisis. With its high mortality rates and low birthrates, the Russian population has been shrinking for more than a decade. This trend is viewed with alarm in Russia for both economic and political reasons. A smaller population means fewer workers and soldiers, and it will likely decrease Russia's power internationally. In the words of Victor Yasmann, a senior regional analyst with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, \"In the future, Russia, whose land makes up 30 percent of Eurasia, may simply have too few people to control its territory.\" (1) The demographic trends have generated a large body of scholarly work in both Russia and the West examining the two primary factors--births and deaths--that determine the size of the population. (2) In this article, I examine another two trends that influence the size of the Russian population and consider their demographic and economic significance: the adoption of Russian children by citizens of other countries and the international trafficking of Russian women. First, I briefly review Russian demographic rhetoric and policy. Next, I examine the trafficking of women from Russia. Finally, I discuss the issues of international adoption and children growing up in state institutions, such as children's homes or boarding schools. Although neither international trafficking nor international adoption occurs on the scale of births and deaths in Russia, they involve those age cohorts with greatest potential for productive and reproductive labor and are therefore worth examining. My findings suggest that although Russian attitudes and policies toward human trafficking and adoption are colored by demographic concerns, government policies generally fail to respond appropriately to the economic causes and consequences of these two phenomena. Demography To address Russia's demographic challenges, post-Soviet leaders, like their Soviet predecessors, have tended to focus on the birthrate, introducing policies intended to persuade women to bear more children, but such an approach will almost certainly not be enough to reverse the current trend, which reflects more than the decline in fertility typical of advanced industrial (or postindustrial) countries, in Russia, this decline has been exacerbated by the economic and social conditions that arose during the transition period. These have led to premature deaths, especially of young males, international trafficking of young women, and the \"export\" of young children through internat","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"27 1","pages":"19-40"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"76140397","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Imagined Communities in an Integrating Baltic Region","authors":"M. Ardovino","doi":"10.3200/DEMO.17.1.5-18","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3200/DEMO.17.1.5-18","url":null,"abstract":"In December 2006, the Estonian government ordered a bronze statue of a Soviet soldier moved from a square in Tallinn to a more obscure location. The statue, which had been erected in 1947, was regarded by ethnic Estonians as a symbol of Soviet occupation and had become an icon of what Benedict Anderson would call old space.1 The statue was perceived to be a symbol of an earlier imperialistic and colonial Soviet occupying force. However, the large ethnic-Russian population in Estonia perceived it as a symbol of liberation from the Nazis, and the Russian Duma responded by denouncing the move. As might be true of a newspaper or a museum, many saw the statue as a tool in promoting an illegitimate identity for many ethnic Estonians.2 The statue's removal would more easily permit the creation (or re-creation) of a new space and a new time for Estonia. Ethnic Estonians, both politicians and the voters who elect them, would consolidate their own imagined community.Investigating Baltic Manifestations of Imagined CommunitiesThe entry of several former Warsaw Pact states into NATO and the EU has made national and ethnic identity issues within these countries more visible and politically sensitive. The nine former Communist societies (with the exception of Slovenia) have a unique perspective on this rapid and large-scale governance and economic change after having spent decades under the political and military tutelage of the Soviet Union. How imagined communities affect the larger European integration movement is not exactly clear. However, public opinion in Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia demonstrates that there are differences based on several factors, making the Baltic states an even more distinct part of the former Warsaw Pact countries. Survey data indicate that not every ethnic group within these societies supports joining the European Union (EU) and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). One factor of possible importance might be the manifestation of imagined communities. Baltic societies are characterized as having pervasive ethnic divisions, with Russians being the dominant minority. Because the region has been considered an important part of the \"near abroad\" by tsarist Russian, Soviet, and modern Russian policymakers, any further loss of Moscow's political and economic influence caused by integration with Europe would conceivably put greater pressure on the Russian government to react. Concomitantly, minority ethnic Russians living in the near abroad might experience greater hardship, as they are politically and culturally separated from their homeland. In these cases, there is a two-way dynamic as Baltic imagined communities interact not only in a state and regional context but also in an international one.According to surveys, up to the point of accession, Estonians, Latvians, and Lithuanians all saw membership in the EU and NATO differently from other ethnic groups and might have taken a different electoral stance if given the chance. In ot","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"74 1","pages":"5-18"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74160866","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Russia and Globalization: Identity, Security, and Society in an Era of Change","authors":"J. Mankoff","doi":"10.5860/choice.46-0542","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5860/choice.46-0542","url":null,"abstract":"Russia and Globalization: Identity, Security, and Society in an Era of Change, Douglas W. Blum, ed. Washington, DC/Baltimore, MD: Woodrow Wilson Center Press/Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008. 383 pp. $60.00Russia and Globalization: Identity, Security, and Society in an Era of Change, edited by Douglas W. Blum, a professor at Providence College and an adjunct professor at Brown University's Watson Institute of International Studies, assembles an impressive array of scholars specializing in fields as far ranging as demography, human rights, and geopolitics. This breadth is one of the book's great strengths, but also one of its biggest weaknesses, as it prevents the authors from adopting a consistent understanding of globalization.The book is divided into two sections, one covering domestic policy and the other foreign policy. Both sections feature contributions from leading scholars at universities in the United States, the European Union, and Russia, with Russian scholars penning seven of the book's thirteen substantive chapters. The individual chapters are generally of high quality, and some, such as Alla Kassianova's essay (chap. 6) on the Russian defense industry or Eduard Solovyev's examination (chap. 11) of the \"geopolitical\" school of thought, make real contributions to our understanding of how different segments of the Russian elite have coped with having globalization thrust on them at a moment when they were still sorting out the transition from Communism.Nonetheless, because the book suffers from a haphazard selection of themes and conceptual confusion, it ends up being less than the sum of its parts. Any edited volume, especially one with over a dozen separate chapters, runs the risk of being unfocused. However, this problem is compounded by the book's failure to clearly explain what \"globalization\" means and its inability to ensure that all of the chapters were written specifically with the aim of charting globalization's impact on Russia. In the introduction, Blum and Ulf Hedetoft initially define globalization as \"a process of intensifying transnational flows, leading to changed spatial and social relations\" (2). They then supplement that fairly neutral definition by adding that globalization is also \"an increasingly controlled and politically engineered process of neo-imperial design\" (ibid.). Needless to say, the Chinese, South Koreans, and many other beneficiaries of globalization might beg to differ with this rather tendentious definition.The contributors to this volume largely refuse to take up this somewhat tendentious definition of globalization; instead, they adopt widely varying understandings of what globalization actually means and in the process deprive the book of conceptual unity. …","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"897 1","pages":"94"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"77474287","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Following Only Some of the Money in Russia","authors":"E. Burger","doi":"10.3200/DEMO.17.1.41-72","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3200/DEMO.17.1.41-72","url":null,"abstract":"In the last ten years, Russia has not developed an effective anti-money laundering (AML) system. Although the country has the legal framework and institutions for combating money laundering, Russia continues to experience a high level of capital flight. Although it is not possible to estimate with precision the amount of funds that have circumvented Russia's currency control system, it probably exceeds the equivalent of billions of dollars. What explains Russia's lack of success in creating an anti-money laundering (AML) system? The Russian economy largely depends on the overseas experts of natural resources (oil, natural gas, metals, etc.). This Russian natural resource sector is dominated by enterprises owned in large party by the state - in effect they are controlled by the country's political elite and their allies. It may be easier to launder money out of Russia than many other countries. Its banking sector is not well-developed; many Russian banks exist simply to service the large enterprises that own them. At the same time, the country's regulators lack sufficient personnel, material assets, and political support to limit high levels of illegal capital flight. Russian enterprises through complex related-party transactions and the circumvention of transfer pricing rules are contributing factors.Furthermore, pervasive governmental corruption, highly sophisticated organized crime groups (OCGs), economic instability, and a limited commitment on the part of law enforcement to uniformly apply AML rules have resulted in a high level of capital flight of illicit funds out of Russia in the past decade. This situation is unlikely to change in the foreseeable future and given the large sums of moneys involved, Russians engaged in money laundering are assured of foreign individuals and organizations eager to profit from the process.","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"106 1","pages":"41-72"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75653793","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Assessing the Courts in Russia: Parameters of Progress under Putin","authors":"P. Solomon","doi":"10.3200/DEMO.16.1.63-74","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3200/DEMO.16.1.63-74","url":null,"abstract":"The Soviet legacy included courts that were dependent and weak, whose reform had only just begun. The Yeltsin era witnessed considerable progress in making judges more independent and powerful, but the efforts were seriously constrained by budgetary shortcomings and paralysis in the legislative approval of needed procedural changes. The Putin administration overcame both of these obstacles and at the same time began addressing the thorny question of how to make courts and judges accountable without undue harm to their independence. The administration also started to address the skepticism about the courts among a significant part of the public through efforts to improve media coverage, make information about courts more available, and make courts user-friendly. Although praiseworthy and bound to improve the reality and the perception of the administration of justice overall, these initiatives did not end attempts to exert influence on judges and case outcomes by powerful people (in the public and private sectors) or the mechanisms that facilitated their efforts.I begin by identifying criteria for assessing the quality of the administration of justice in any country, including in the post-Soviet world, and suggesting specific markers (usually qualitative) connected to each of the criteria developed above. Then, I provide an account of relevant policy initiatives in judicial reform undertaken first under Yeltsin and then in the Putin years. After that I provide an assessment of the state of the courts in the Russian Federation in 2007 in light of the criteria and markers supplied in the first section. I conclude with a look to the future and the identification of crucial markers of change for the post-Putin era.Criteria of Assessment and MarkersThe purpose of courts is to provide to members of the public the opportunity to obtain the impartial resolution of disputes (mainly through adjudication, but sometimes through mediation) in a timely manner. Courts must act fairly and expeditiously, and the design of judicial systems should contribute to these ends.I propose seven criteria for assessing a court system, some of which break down into a number of components, each of which can serve as markers.1 They are the independence of judges and courts; procedural law aimed at ensuring equality among the parties; the power of the courts; the system of judicial accountability; accessibility of the courts; efficiency of performance (and the factors that encourage it); and public attitudes toward the courts.By judicial independence I mean structural arrangements that improve the chances of impartial outcomes by reducing or eliminating potential lines of dependence of judges, both on external sources and on others within the judicial system. Three basic markers of an independent judiciary (necessary, but not necessarily sufficient to produce impartiality) are (1) a system of tenure that reduces a judge's potential fear of reprisal for decisions (such as tenure ","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"24 1","pages":"63-73"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2008-10-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86863002","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The First Steps of Russia's Public Chamber: Representation or Coordination?","authors":"Alfred B. Evans","doi":"10.3200/DEMO.16.4.345-362","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3200/DEMO.16.4.345-362","url":null,"abstract":"As president of Russia, Vladimir Putin made speeches containing many references to the importance of building a strong civil society. Yet, in light of his consistent efforts to centralize power, what is the nature of Putin's conception of civil society?1 Most scholars of civil society view it as the sphere of organized social life that gives scope to Russian citizens' initiative and is relatively independent from the state.2 In contrast to this notion, in April 2005, I argued that \"Putin envisions a well-ordered civil society as a network of organizations that formally remain outside the boundaries of the state and provide needed representation for citizens' interests while also serving as part of the system of support for the structures of political authority.\"3 Inherent tension exists between the desire to maintain control over the framework within which social organizations operate and the hope that such organizations will effectively voice their members' demands.Putin's speeches emphasize integrating civil society into the Russian executive branch's network of support for several years, but determined moves to translate that goal into reality began only in early 2004, and toward the end of his term, Putin's regime made progress fleshing out the structures of civil society in a form that Putin considers appropriate for Russia.4 A variety of political systems' experiences teach us that the meaning of any broad idea concerning the creation of new institutional structures may change in subtle ways during its implementation. Here, I examine the creation of the Public Chamber (OP), a new institution that was created to form the capstone of a corporatist quasi-civil society in Russia under Putin, and the actions it took during its first year. The OP has not resolved the tension between the apparently contradictory themes in Putin's design for civil society, emphasizing both the independence of social organizations and their dedication to the state's goals, and indeed, that tension has heightened as the most prominent institution introduced in pursuit of Putin's goals for civil society has taken on a life of its own in an ambiguous manner.The Public Chamber: Proposal and CreationIt is possible to see the November 2001 Civic Forum held in Moscow as foreshadowing the OP. The Civic Forum brought together 5,000 representatives of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to meet government officials. In John Squier's assessment, the Civic Forum's purpose was to integrate \"civil society organizations throughout Russia into a single corporatist body that would allow them an official consultative role with the government.\"5 Complaints from many social organizations' leaders apparently discouraged the government from following through on that plan after the Civic Forum adjourned. The essential conception was not forgotten, however. Putin revived the idea in a speech he delivered in September 2004 after the Beslan school hostage crisis. Putin stressed the need to ","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"16 1","pages":"345-362"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2008-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"85503957","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Political Graft and Education Corruption in Ukraine: Compliance, Collusion, and Control","authors":"Ararat L. Osipian","doi":"10.3200/DEMO.16.4.323-344","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3200/DEMO.16.4.323-344","url":null,"abstract":"Corruption is a growing problem throughout the world. According to some estimates, countries with transition economies are the most corrupt. Transparency International and World Bank surveys both show that Ukraine is an especially corrupt country.1 According to the corruption perceptions index (CPI) that Transparency International calculates annually, Ukraine ranked 83rd out of the 91 countries surveyed in 2001.2 In 2006, Ukraine was given a score of 2.8, making it 99th out of 163 countries.3A number of scholarly publications and national surveys in Ukraine confirmed that corruption is a problem. For instance, a 2002 Ukrainian Institute of Social Research poll showed that 78 percent of respondents believed that all or most government officials have accepted bribes. More than 80 percent stated that corruption was prevalent within the judicial branch of the government, and 71 percent believed that most government officials were tied to the mafia or private family business relations. Moreover, a good portion of Ukrainians are inclined to accept bribery as a normal part of everyday life.4 Peter Solomon and Todd Foglesong note that the number of reported corruption-related incidents in Ukraine rose 250 percent between 1990 and 1998. By 1998, there were 2,449 incidents, which led to 1,641 convictions.5 According to the data presented by the Civil Organization Committee against Corruption and Organized Crime, the number of reports of corruption sent to court by Ukranian law enforcement agencies for trial increased from 5,862 in 2006 to 5,994 in 2007.6Corruption may be found in many sectors of the national economy, including higher education. Corruption in education is more detrimental than typical bureaucratic corruption. Corruption in higher education is detrimental to society for three major reasons: (1) it has a negative impact on the economy and society because it hinders the system's efficiency; (2) it hurts society by negatively affecting educational programs; and (3) it diminishes social cohesion, because students learn corrupt practices. Corruption in higher education negatively affects access to higher education, quality of higher education services, and equity. The development of a substantial private sector in higher education has led to increased corruption. Private higher education institutions are as corrupt as their public counterparts, proving that people other than public officials are susceptible to corruption.Corruption in Higher EducationThere are 680,000 licensed openings (and no unlicensed openings) for freshmen in approximately 480 higher education institutions in Ukraine, 80 percent of which are in public higher education institutions and 20 percent are in private institutions. There are also numerous public community colleges and vocational schools. There are more openings in higher education institutions in Ukraine than there are candidates willing to pursue college degrees, including openings in distance-learning programs, cor","PeriodicalId":39667,"journal":{"name":"Demokratizatsiya","volume":"5 1","pages":"323-344"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2008-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82218172","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}