Vertical and Horizontal Power in Rural Tatarstan

ABSTRACT The article presents the results of the first stage of a project (July 2017) to study Russian and Tatar villages in different regions of the Volga region and Siberia conducted by sociologists, economists, and historians from Novosibirsk and Kazan. The study considers the functioning and development of ten rural settlements with different ethnic compositions in the Republic of Tatarstan. According to the authors, local government is largely determined by the high integration of rural self-government with the strictly subordinated apparatus of republican vertical power. The study draws attention to several regional differences resulting from differences in resource potential, intrinsic qualities, and the political capital of the administrative leaders of raions and settlements, who interact with republican and local elites. The desire to preserve national identity, which is most prominent in settlements where the titular ethnic group is predominant, has a significant impact on local economic and sociocultural practices and, ultimately, on the performance of rural self-governing bodies.