Research in Politics & International Relations

Crafting Authoritarian Politics

Investigators: Stephen White
Funded by: ESRC
Dates: May 2008 - January 2011

The ESRC's research exchange with the Australian Research Council allows scholars in both countries to make joint applications to further the collaboration. In this case I have teamed up with Ian McAllister to focus on the distinctive political systems that have developed in postcommunist Russia and some of the other post-Soviet republics, which are neither liberal democracies nor repressive dictatorships and which at the same time appear to have a capacity to reproduce themselves over an extended period.

In part, we will be using the results of a representative national survey, but we will also be using focus groups and other forms of qualitative evidence that will tell us more than surveys about perceptions of political efficacy. There will also be funding to support a research assistant, and visits in each direction. It is hoped that the research will make possible a large-scale study of the Russian voter, and that there will be a series of more focused contributions on the nature of these distinctive systems.

The total value of the award is £82,200.27