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An epistemic community in abeyance: the work of Russian anti-violence NGOs in a restrictive legal climate
Abstract
This article examines how Russian NGOs in the field of domestic violence operate in a legal climate characterised by both state restriction and support. I conceptualise anti-violence NGOs that belong to a network as an ‘epistemic community’ and demonstrate that NGOs in my study faced challenges to the recognition of their expertise by state representatives and to the promotion of their vision of policy change. Yet, these NGOs continued to invest their resources in educational events for state specialists. I propose to theorise these educational events as a means of developing a knowledge-based network that can support domestic violence survivors despite lacking formal mechanisms of inter-agency collaboration.
... In addition to opposing the notion of gender as a social construct, groups that employ the discourse of traditional values in Russia also criticise the notions of children's rights and women's rights as part of a 'Western' ideology that threatens to destroy the patriarchal family and undermine parental authority (Iarskaia-Smirnova and Romanov, 2015). Consequently, non-profits that work in a broadly defined field of women's rights, including anti-violence organisations, struggle to contribute to policy making despite the recognition of their expertise by state actors at the regional level (Davidenko, 2020). This is evidenced in their ongoing attempts to promote a law on domestic violence. ...
... Consequently, in comparison with the early non-government crisis centres that worked actively to advocate for domestic and sexual violence legislation, organisations that appeared in the 2000s rarely engaged in activities aimed at effecting policy change (Johnson and Saarinen, 2011). This tendency to avoid lobbying became even more pronounced after the introduction of the Foreign Agents Law (Davidenko, 2020). As noted earlier, according to this legislation, a non-profit that received foreign funding and engaged in 'political activity' had to be included in a registry of foreign agents. ...
... For anti-violence NPOs, political activity came to be linked primarily to the expression of support for the bill on the prevention of domestic violence. To avoid the negative consequences associated with the label of a foreign agent, anti-violence NPOs included in the sample for the present study refrained from any public mention of the bill and gradually stopped receiving any foreign funding (Davidenko, 2020). ...
Research on non-profit organisations’ (NPOs’) administrative advocacy suggests that while restrictive regulatory legislation hinders their activities, ambiguous state policy on particular social issues provides opportunities to advance their agenda. To better understand how non-profits conduct their administrative advocacy in a context characterised by both restrictive regulatory legislation and state policy ambiguity, this article examines Russian NPOs that are dealing with the contested issue of domestic violence. Drawing on network governance theory, the study investigates how these organisations navigated this complex terrain of restrictions and opportunities. It finds that anti-violence NPOs employed collaborative tactics to engage staff of state agencies who directly interact with citizens, while facing the risk of state-sanctioned repressions due to the potential classification of their work as political. By considering a case of administrative advocacy in a contentious policy field, this article argues for the need to account for the broader political context when researching non-profit advocacy.
... Women activists involved in anti-violence work established a network of women's crisis centers across Russia that provided psychological, legal, social support, and, in some cases, shelter to survivors of violence. They also managed to raise awareness on gender-based violence and women's rights among state actors (Johnson & Saarinen 2013, 561) despite experiencing increasing pressure on the part of the state to cease all political activity (Davidenko 2020(Davidenko , 1341. Crisis center feminists promoted an ethics of direct help as activism (Johnson & Saarinen 2013, 555), and they were still around when the next feminist generation came looking for role models and activist traditions. ...
... This dream, however, is hard to realize: establishing a feminist crisis center requires considerable material resources, specialized professional competences, and time, all of which most grassroots feminists lack. Moreover, the current political climate for opening an independent feminist NGO is notoriously unfavorable in Russia (Davidenko 2020(Davidenko , 1329. Thus, whereas in contrast to contentious action, there is no controversy among feminists about the legitimacy of direct help to survivors of violence, this kind of activism is inhibited, just as contentious action is, by lacking resources and restricted political opportunities. ...
... 133 This difference between the two generations is, I suggest, due to a difference in political opportunities. In contrast to the 90s, the mid-2000s when the contemporary feminist movement emerged were a time when Western funders were few in Russia and the state increasingly restricted independent NGO activity (Temkina & Zdravomyslova 2014, 262;Davidenko 2020Davidenko , 1329. This was, therefore, a context that did not favor either organizing formally or working transnationally. ...
„Russland“ und „Feminismus“ scheinen eine fragliche Kombination zu sein. Russland ist eher für neopatriarchale Politik bekannt, die für Feminismus kaum Platz lässt. Doch in den letzten 15 Jahren ist in Russland eine feministische Basisbewegung entstanden. Was tut sie? Wie kann sie sich in einem ungünstigen Kontext durchsetzen? Wie massenhaft und inklusiv ist diese Bewegung und wie geht sie mit inneren Konflikten um? Kerndaten dieser Studie sind qualitative Interviews mit Feminist*innen aus vier Städten in Russland, ergänzt durch mehrjährige Beobachtung der feministischen Szenen. Aufgrund dieser Daten behaupte ich, dass die zeitgenössische feministische Bewegung in Russland eine dezentrale Basisbewegung ist, welche Macht auf mehreren Ebenen der sozialen Organisation herausfordert. Neben dem öffentlichen Protest übt sie diskursive Politik aus und wirkt durch die Einführung neuer Definitionen und Denkweisen direkt auf die Gesellschaft. Intersektional betrachtet wird die Bewegungsbeteiligung durch Mehrfachmarginalisierung aufgrund des Ressourcenmangels und Disempowerment beeinträchtigt. Kollektive Lösungen können Ressourcenumverteilung und Berücksichtigung von Differenz darstellen. Debatten um Differenz und Inklusion sind ein zentraler Bereich, in welchem die feministische Bewegung soziale Innovation herstellt. Schließlich verortet diese Studie die zeitgenössische feministische Bewegung in Russland in einem globalen postkolonialen Kontext. Ich behaupte, dass ein lineares Fortschrittsnarrativ, welches Feminismus als Kennzeichen der westlichen Moderne konstruiert, die Beziehung zwischen russländischen und westlichen Feminismen sowie die Machtdynamiken zwischen Feminist*innen in Metropolen, (post-)kolonialen und nichtkolonialen Peripherien Russlands prägt. An scheinbar für eine feministische Praxis ungeeigneten Orten widerstehen Feminist*innen kolonialen und imperialen Narrativen und betreiben eine auf lokalen Erfahrungen basierende feministische Politik.
... 42 An interviewee summarised the general attitude in the community of feminist and pro-gender equality activists to Tsvetkova's case as follows: 'Putin's state decriminalised wifebeating and criminalised female anatomy, and I read it as a political message'. 43 Against the backdrop of shrinking spaces for self-expression and activism, women's NGOs choose to give up or downsize their projects and keep a low profile (Davidenko 2020), whereas individual feminist activists emigrate or are forced into exile. A feminist environmental activist who is currently seeking political asylum believed that she was left with no choice: 'After the state destroyed our organisation, I realised that my political position directly threatens my freedom, and I didn't want to be one more Yulia Tsvetkova, so I ran away'. ...
Against the backdrop of the increasing global schisms around gender equality in recent years, the discussion of Russia’s domestic anti-gender politics is coming to the fore. To date, however, little work has bridged the domestic–international divide in this discussion by thoroughly examining the interplay between Russian foreign policy, national branding and the domestic conservative turn. This gap inspires the twofold question underscoring this essay: how do anti-gender discourses emerge in Russian politics, and with what effect do these discourses travel across different political contexts?
The Narrative Policy Framework (NPF) has become a popular, positivist approach to studying how narratives affect the policy process over the past 10 years. In this paper, we critically evaluate its applicability in an authoritarian context. We employ a mixed-method approach to, first, present some of the narrative elements employed by principal actors in the policy debate according to the NPF, derived through quantitative content analysis, and second, to critically contrast these findings by drawing on qualitative data. The policy we examine is Moscow’s contentious Renovation program, which aims to demolish many of the city’s Soviet-era five story ‘Kruschovsky’ apartment blocks and resettle residents in new apartments. The quantitative content analysis is derived from several online government sources and that of the principal opponent of the Renovation program, an online group called ‘Moscovites Against Demolition’. The qualitative data are derived from a district in Southwest Moscow, where the first Kruschovsky apartments were developed and has locally seen vocal opposition to the Renovation program and other redevelopment projects. This study highlights the limitations of the NPF and argues that by examining the performative nature of policy narratives, we can gain greater insight into the political strategies and context that underwrite these narratives.
This article takes a fresh look at nonprofit/government relations in the context of both the partnership literature on collaboration and the closing space literature on repression. Following the Weberian ideal-type approach, we develop a heuristic tool for nuanced analyses of relations between the sectors in comparative research that is applicable in diverse political regime settings. We integrate foundational conceptions of Salamon, Young, and Najam to develop our framework, which we then illustrate with the cases of Russia and China. While repression is not necessarily the predominant characteristic of nonprofit–government relations in authoritarian regime settings, the reduction of intersectoral relations to collaboration strategies common in Western contexts also falls short of capturing the full complexity of the relationship. Rather than trying to establish national patterns, researchers need to remain sensitive to the coexistence of multiple government/nonprofit relationship types, affecting various parts of the nonprofit sector differently.
In present-day Russia, the government’s approach towards the non-profit sector is in many ways ambivalent and contradictory. The Russian government follows two opposing strategies: it largely suppresses independent and potentially critical NPOs, while at the same time co-opting those that function in line with government priorities. The essay analyses the ways in which NPOs have perceived the dual nature of governmental policies and how these policies have affected the non-profit sector in Russia’s regions. The essay argues that, by creating divisions between different types of NPOs, government policies have exerted a negative influence on the internal solidarity of the Russian non-profit sector.
Russia has recently cracked down on politically active civil society, increasing regulation and undercutting foreign support. However, apolitical, service-oriented parts of civil society have not been subject to these restrictive policies. In contrast, since 2009 Russia has introduced a set of government tools to support socially oriented non-profit organisations. These tools present a framework akin to concepts of ‘third-party government’ and collaborative governance that have come to dominate Western public administration discourse. This article discusses the Russian government’s divergent positions towards civil society, the nature and extent of the supportive tool kit, and its prospects.
This article suggests that Chinese NGO do not have the conviction that they are part of an epistemic community in mainland China. Interviews conducted in four cities, Chongqing, Kunming, Nanjing and Shanghai, suggests that this can be attributed to a lack of set standards and professionalization governing their sector of operation. Further, the study finds that Chinese NGOs do not see their primary role is to produce knowledge within their organizational development life cycle. This may indicate a varying path towards the maturation of the civil society sector in China, whereby Chinese NGOs do not conform to the organizational development process as outlined in extant NGO literature. 本文认为中国的非政府组织并不确信自己是内地认知共同体的一部分。根据本文作者在重庆、昆明、南京和上海四个城市进行的访谈，这主要是由于缺乏一套专业性的管理标准和规范。另外，研究显示中国NGO 不认为其首要任务是在自身组织发展生命周期内产出知识。这意味着中国民间团体走的是一条不同的发展道路，中国非政府组织的组织发展过程不符合现存NGO 文献中的描述。[Available in English and Chinese]
This essay discusses the medicalisation of contraception by gynaecologists in present-day Russia. I explore the disciplining discourse and tactics of gynaecologists as experts who aim to orient women towards properly planned and prepared pregnancy. Gynaecologists are important agents of reproductive control because they instruct women in detail about reproductive health and contraception. However, these disciplining medical discourses and professional practices are characterised by inconsistency. In accordance with the demographic priorities of the state, doctors are more oriented towards pregnancy treatment than consultation on contraception, and they are inconsistent in their regulation of contraceptive use. This biopolitical regime reflects the demographic priorities of the Russian state—to increase the population of Russia—and the role of women as the primary objects of this policy.
This paper examines how civic organisations dealing with social rights have responded to Russian welfare reforms. As beneficiaries of the Soviet paternalistic system of social provision, their interest has been to resist neoliberal policy shifts. However, the crackdown on non-governmental organisations (NGOs) under President Putin de-incentivises making challenging political claims. By distinguishing between ‘rent-seeking’ and ‘profit-seeking’ activities of NGOs (resulting in either the redistribution or production of public wealth), this paper enhances understanding of state–society relations in Russia. It highlights contradictory practices that allow the state to reduce overt, politicised protest by providing channels for certain privileged social groups and organisations.
The increased salience of how to value ecosystems services has driven up the demand for policy-relevant knowledge. It is clear that advice by epistemic communities can show up in policy outcomes, yet little systematic analysis exists prescribing how this can actually be achieved. This paper draws on four decades of knowledge utilisation research to propose four types of `possible expert' who might be influential on ecosystems services. Broad findings of a literature review on knowledge use in public policy are reported, and the four-fold conceptualisation pioneered by Carol Weiss that defines the literature is outlined. The field is then systematised by placing these four modes of knowledge use within an explanatory typology of policy learning. With how, when, and why experts and their knowledge are likely to show up in policy outcomes established, the paper then proposes the boundaries of the possible in how the ecosystems services epistemic community might navigate the challenges associated with each learning mode. Four possible experts emerge: with political antenna and epistemic humility; with the ability to speak locally and early to the hearts and minds of citizens; with a willingness to advocate policy; and, finally, with an enhanced institutional awareness and peripheral policy vision. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of the utility of the analysis.
This article examines state–civil society relationships in contemporary Russia. Its objective is to assess opportunity structures of Russian non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that are intertwined with the state. The article presents qualitative data from fieldwork in the Russian cities of Moscow, St Petersburg, Nizhniy Novgorod, and Perm in 2009 and 2010. The focus of NGOs in the field of disability was chosen because of their roles as social service providers and as advocates for the rights of the disabled. The findings indicate that despite the Soviet legacy of an occupying state, Russian NGOs widen their opportunities by maintaining close relationships with state structures. Thus, litigation strategies seem to be an effective instrument for fostering social change for the benefit of the disabled.
This article charts the ideology and mobilization of the women’s crisis center movement—the most recognizable example of postcommunist feminist activism until 2011—over the first decade of the twenty-first century as Russia moved toward consolidation and authoritarianism. We draw on our experience in and observation of this movement, a 2008 photoethnography project, and a nationwide survey of crisis centers conducted in 2008–9. By the end of Vladimir Putin’s first presidency, we find that Russia’s semiauthoritarianism was infused with a new masculinism, leaving less room for self-identified feminisms and for feminisms that include critique of male roles. The crisis centers as a phenomenon were etaticized and domesticated: they no longer resembled an autonomous movement, and much of the feminism had been lost. Yet even staff at state agencies frame their work in the language of women’s rights, a shift from their earlier tendency to assert that women provoke the violence against them. Previous studies of feminism under authoritarianism suggest that feminism is often driven underground, both in terms of activities and the way activists can frame their claims. Our study suggests that in the growing number of semiauthoritarian states such as Russia, feminism may go inside the state, a tribute to the transnational women’s activism of the last three decades. However, such insider feminism often has much more moderate claims and comes at the expense of autonomous feminism.
This article explores the conceptual challenges of devising viable feminist strategies for reproductive politics in contemporary Russia. It analyzes three issues—abortion, surrogate motherhood, and family support politics—and the distinct cultural, historical, and institutional politics that make these issues sites of gendered inequality. Inspired by Nanette Funk’s argument that feminist critiques of Anglo-American liberalism cannot be readily exported to Eastern and Central Europe, the article inquires into the value of liberal concepts of individual autonomy and a private sphere for promoting women’s interests on these matters. It also explores the question of how to conceptualize a feminist approach to family support in a context where dependency on the state has been a long-standing source of domination. The article demonstrates how the politics of reproduction reveals the need to link feminism in Russia with both the promotion of women’s autonomy and the strengthening of families and other units of caregiving. Hybrid approaches melding liberal and ethics-of-care concerns to establish feminism’s relevance to Russian women’s interests are most urgent.
This article examines the development of civil society in Russia. We argue that cultural and societal norms, which developed during the Soviet period, have continued to shape civil society arrangements in the post-Soviet period. We examine how parallel to recent changes in Russia’s economic, political and legal environment, shifts in Russia’s contemporary civil society arrangements have occurred. We argue that, similar to a Russian-style democracy and market economy, Russian-style civil society arrangements are clearly emerging. These changes are explained by the cultural–historic legacies of both the Soviet Union and the subsequent peculiarities of Russia’s economic, social and political transformations since the collapse of the Soviet Union. In this Russian variant of civil society, its agents have developed and continue to maintain strong and dependent relationships on the state.
This article examines the forms and logic ofpolitical activism encouraged by int e rn ational development agencies in Russia by focusing on the project to promote civil society development. The ve rsion ofc ivil society that has been brought into being by we s t e rn design—the third sector—is far from wh at Russian activ i s t s d e s i red and wh at donor agencies promised. Despite its claims to allow a gr a s s r o o t s to flourish, the third sector is a professionalized realm ofNGOs, inaccessible to most local groups and compromised by its links to a neoliberal vision ofdevelopment. The article pushes beyond some ofthe recent polarized discussions of NGOs (wh e re they are rega rded as either “go o d ”or “bad”) to show that despite its a m b ivalent eff e c t s, the idea ofthe third sector remains compelling to local actors. D r awing on ex t e n s ive ethnogr aphic fi e l dwork with provincial wo m e n’s gr o u p s, this article examines local responses to the third sector and considers its unexpected signifying possibilities.[Postsocialism, civil society, third sector, gender]
This article develops a model and typology of government-nongovernmental organization (NGO) relationships to enable both a rapid appraisal of government-NGO relationships in a particular context and to identify the characteristics and possible structure of alternative relationship types. Building on the literature on the subject, the model defines eight possible relationship types based on several dimensions: government's resistance or acceptance of institutional pluralism, the relative balance of power in the relationship, and the degree of formality and - by extension - the level of government linkage. The model and typology are designed to assist governments, NGOs, donors, and other development practitioners to identify and promote the most productive government-NGO relationship for a particular context.
The role of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the development of Russia's civil society has been the focus of academic study since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. In light of this literature, this article aims to assess the impact of the movement that has most often been seen as very promising for Russia's future civil society development—the environmental movement—by utilising research undertaken in Samara Oblast’ of the Russian Federation. While the results do reveal some positive contributions to civil society development in Russia, they also exhibit many similarities with other studies in the extant literature, illustrating the relative weakness of Russia's social movements in the area of civil society development.
What are NGOs actually doing in Russia? and What is their role (actual or potential) in Russian democracy? What political and societal impact do NGOs have in Russia today? Do the recent developmental trends in the Russian NGO sector bode well for a civil society that bolsters and strengthens democratic institutions? In this article I consider those questions in relation to one segment of the Russian NGO sector: women's organizations. Women's NGOs are an important sector to observe in Russian civil society for several reasons. First, women's movements are widely considered to be an important part of independent civil societies. With the growth of women's movements around the world in the second half of the twentieth century, women's NGOs are a prominent example of the kinds of nongovernmental advocacy organizations that have blossomed in democratic regimes. Practical observers have frequently upheld them as examples of the success of civil society in new democracies, or at least as a key component of the NGO sector that should be supported by donors of foreign democracy assistance. Patrice McMahon points out that "the theoretical link between democratization and women's advocacy groups was, in fact, never questioned" by representatives of foreign assistance foundations.
This article contributes to scrutiny of feminist transnationalism by providing an ethnographic investigation of one of its most prominent campaigns. Thanks to the efforts of feminist activists, violence against women is now an international development issue, backed by the UN and prioritized by international donors and NGOs. I consider this success from the perspective of postsocialist Russia, where the first crisis centers have been set up in recent years. I argue that the campaigns have troubling effects: the framing of violence against women screens out local constructions of events, and deflects attention from issues of social justice. Presenting insights gained in the context of an action research project undertaken with one group, this article highlights local contestation about the campaigns, exploring the competing conceptions of the "crisis" facing Russian women that they have displaced. In highlighting these alternative constructions, it examines the extent to which activists have been able to translate the issue and to root it in their concerns.
This volume is the first to take a systematic look at the position of women in the post-Soviet states of the former USSR. It is divided into two main parts: the first focuses on the economy, society and polity of the Russian Federation; the second gives specialists' insights into social, political, economic and military developments in the other republics of the former Soviet Union. The book pays special attention to women's own perceptions of their lives. How do factory workers, street vendors and rural workers view their jobs? How do the women who served in Afghanistan, migrants, politicians, political activists, soldiers' mothers and feminists portray their worlds. What strategies of coping have women devised to deal with no electricity in Armenia, with unwelcome sexual advances from fathers-in-law and with violence from partners in Russia? Why did women in Georgia travel on a peace train? How has war affected lives in the Caucasus and in Central Asia? This book explores strategies of coping and forms of adaptation, noting that women are agents, as well as victims.
EUROPE-ASIA STUDIES, 2018
Vol. 70, No. 4, June 2018, 501–513
The Carrot or the Stick? Constraints and
Opportunities of Russia’s CSO Policy
ELENA BOGDANOVA, LINDA J. COOK & MERI KULMALA
This collection of essays is devoted to analysis of current trends in Russian civil society development after the recent changes in the state policy that both restricts and supports the activities of Russian civil society organisations (CSOs). Many of the essays in this collection were first presented at the international conference ‘“Between the Carrot and the Stick”: Emerging Needs and Forms for Non-State Actors including NGOs and Informal Organisations in Contemporary Russia’ that took place in January 2016.1 The essays focus on CSOs and state–society relations in contemporary Russia. Nearly all
are based on recent field research including interviews with CSO leaders, activists, and other actors connected with the sector. Overall, they paint a negative but nuanced picture of organisations confronting restrictive government legislation, particularly the so-called
‘Foreign Agents Law’ (Federal Law No. 121), which controls Russian CSOs that receive international funding and engage in political activity.2 The authors report damaging effects of the law on individual CSOs, including those in particular issue areas such as environmental and human rights organisations, and the sector as a whole. The essays discuss NGOs’ survival strategies in the face of these new
restrictions, documenting an impressive range of strategies that reveal the resourcefulness and resilience of the sector. Contributors also address the Russian state’s efforts to engage ‘socially
oriented’ NGOs (SONGOs) in social policy-making and the delivery of social services.
After the 2011–2012 electoral protest cycles, the opportunity structures for a broad range of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have been narrowed. This essay argues that increased control over NGOs mirrors a deeper conflict of governance models, which is endogenous to the Russian political system, between bureaucratic modernisation and patronal politics. The modernisation sought by the Kremlin under Medvedev’s term brought a greater demand for organisations capable of fulfilling the dual purpose of public communication and state advisory functions. This required clear legal definitions, areas of competence and rules of conduct. However, patronal politics dictate that NGOs should bow to the state, and be governed by diffuse principles of loyalty.
This essay analyses how the ‘foreign agent’ law has been interpreted and implemented by the Russian authorities and examines diverse NGO survival strategies in response to the ‘foreign agent’ label. The foreign agent law has disrupted and transformed resource mobilisation strategies and transnational NGO networks. Based on qualitative research on environmental NGOs, we offer a typology of NGO responses to the foreign agent law, providing examples to show how the organisations attempt to ensure their survival.
The essay examines the social policy principles underlying state funding schemes that shape the functioning of non-profit organisations in service delivery in Russia. Scrutinising federal and regional financial tools, the analysis reveals that some non-profit organisations are engaged with a neoliberal logic promoting state funding based on competitive grant processes and a means-tested approach to clients, while others seek privileged access to state resources to secure a statist and stratified service provision for their members. The essay argues that neoliberal principles are extended through contracting-out and are undermining statist practices; however, a situation is emerging within competitive outsourcing procedures in which selected organisations are still receiving privileged treatment from the state.
The essay investigates the survival strategies of foreign-funded Russian non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the face of the so-called ‘foreign agents’ law of 2012. Conceptualising NGOs as autonomous social systems and drawing on two qualitative case studies of Russian NGOs in the fields of human rights protection, we show how these organisations manage to cope with the state’s withdrawal of legitimacy by creatively handling their diverse environmental dependencies. Through shifting the relative importance of different audiences and generating new sources of legitimacy, they have eventually created and maintained small supportive ecologies within the overall environment of a political regime that does not tolerate them.
This article asks why the Russian government has developed new avenues for public participation in policymaking and delivery and assesses the extent to which these avenues introduce pluralism into these processes. Drawing on 50 interviews with individuals and citizens’ groups involved in either public consultative bodies or socially oriented NGOs, the article demonstrates the government’s desire to harness the knowledge and abilities of citizens and civic groups in place of state departments perceived to be bureaucratic and inefficient, while controlling and curtailing their participation. Arguing that these countervailing tendencies can be conceptualized as limited pluralism, a category elaborated by Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan, we show that citizens and civic groups are able to influence policy outcomes to varying extents using these mechanisms.
The article attempts to analyze the mechanisms of political control used by the Kremlin vis-à-vis its rivals. Russian authorities had opted the politics of fear, which include overt intimidation and public discrediting of the regime's critics, and selective persecution and open harassment of opposition activists and/or supporters. This approach to political control to some degree reproduced similar mechanisms that had enabled regime survival in the late-Soviet period, and fit general trends of repressive policies in a number of contemporary authoritarian regimes. The article discusses causes and mechanisms of the politics of fear in contemporary Russia, its roots in comparative and historical contexts, and strengths and weaknesses of repressive policy in Russia from the viewpoints of the regime, the opposition, and Russian society.
This article questions the widely held notions of Russian exceptionalism as regards its state–society relations, arguing that the conceptual tools used to study governance in other regions and contexts are applicable in Russia, opening the potential for fruitful comparisons and dialogue. Our analytical framework for studying Russian governance emphasises the concept of networking. We posit that even in contemporary hybrid authoritarian regimes the state is dependent on interactive governance arrangements involving civil society actors. The article applies the analytical framework to an initial synthesis of findings from studies of Russian governance, reported elsewhere in the symposium.
The article examines the role of civil society in Russian governance networks, focusing on power relations between state and non-state actors. The analysis is based on empirical evidence from concrete governance networks in two major cities, St. Petersburg and Samara, that handle complex social issues – integration of migrants, drug prevention, and child protection. Power asymmetries are reflected in tight state control of governance networks’ agenda, membership, and opportunity to affect policy. The governance networks are first and foremost advisory bodies with very limited decision-making authority.
This article examines how governance networks and “vertical”, that is, hierarchical or coercive, modes of governance are related to each other under the circumstances of increasing authoritarianism in Russia. The empirical data from nine in-depth case studies focusing on negotiations between administrations, non-governmental organisations, companies, and experts during environmental impact assessments were collected in the Russian regions of Krasnodar and Irkutsk. The data confirm that regional and federal authorities resort to control and coercion, but also promote cooperation in order to solve policy problems and compensate for the poor performance of formal institutions.
I contend that the pattern of state-society relations best for a particular context depends on a series of important tradeoffs and risk assessments associated with each. I discuss two such patterns, which I refer to as "models" because they reflect distillations of important relationships that serve as useful heuristic devices as well as rough blueprints to guide policymakers interested in promoting one of the patterns. The statist model places society at greater risk of falling into tyranny while minimizing the chances of anarchy. The liberal model runs a greater risk of anarchy while minimizing the risk of tyranny. The collective selection of model must, of course, be made locally. But the choice should be made with full awareness of the dangers and pitfalls associated with each, with judicious learning from foreign and domestic historical experience, and in conditions where people are able freely to debate and choose between ideas to which they have ready access. To suggest a preliminary choice for Russia, my analysis ventures that a liberal conception of state-society relations is actually most appropriate given Russia's historical and cultural context as well as public opinion. I then step back to consider the most positive roles that foreigners might play in these processes.
Just a few years ago, most Russian citizens did not recognize the notion of domestic violence or acknowledge that such a problem existed. Today, after years of local and international pressure to combat violence against women, things have changed dramatically. Gender Violence in Russia examines why and how this shift occurred - and why there has been no similar reform on other gender violence issues such as rape, sexual assault, or human trafficking. Drawing on more than a decade of research, Janet Elise Johnson analyzes media coverage and survey data to explain why some interventions succeed while others fail. She describes the local-global dynamics between a range of international actors, from feminist activists to national governments, and an equally diverse set of Russian organizations and institutions.
Despite the growth in studies of Russian social policy, the reality of the social policy process – most of which is regionally based – remains a puzzle. In this article, we stake a claim for the importance of studying street-level social service provision in Russia's regions to advance the understanding of social policymaking in authoritarian-leaning regimes. We show that – albeit in small ways in only some places – Russia has expanded its welfare state, taking on an issue neglected by the Soviet regime in response to activism. Using the lens of work against domestic violence, we conduct a case study of women's crisis centres in Saint Petersburg. We show the limitations of the two usual state-society frameworks – those looking at civil society and at the welfare state. Building on their strengths, we construct a de facto feminist framework that focuses on how much and what kind of help citizens receive from both state and societal actors. In Russia's social policymaking, shaped by federalism, we find mixed success –civic organizations have weakened, but the state has taken on civic initiatives at local levels – and point to the importance of the informal politics of speaking in code and navigating elite networks.
This paper challenges widespread philosophical and conceptual theories of the nonprofit sector and the state that question, or leave little conceptual room for, extensive cooperation between nonprofit organizations and government. To do so, the paper calls attention to shortcomings in the prevailing market failure/government failure theories of the nonprofit sector that have obscured recognition of key features of the sector that make cooperation with the state a natural and necessary path to effectiveness, and to certain inherent limitations of the state that make engagement of nonprofits a natural and useful path to state effectiveness. The article then outlines a set of conditions that must be met by both nonprofits and governments for this partnership to achieve the promise of which it is capable. © 2015, International Society for Third-Sector Research and The Johns Hopkins University.
This article examines how socially oriented non-governmental organisations (SO NGOs) in Russia conceptualise the state’s role in guaranteeing social rights and negotiate relations with the state. It demonstrates that these organisations see the state as playing a key role in guaranteeing social rights. This facilitates a degree of agency in their relationship with the authorities, who are increasingly keen to use the experience SO NGOs provide for service delivery. This challenges the dominant view of compliant social NGOs which fully cooperate with the authorities and highlights the need for a more nuanced understanding of Russia’s state–civil society relations.
This article seeks to unravel the dual realities represented by the juxtaposition of the recent series of harsh regulatory impositions on Russian nonprofit organizations and the nearly simultaneous enactment of a series of laws and decrees establishing an impressive “tool box” of positive support programs for a large class of the so-called socially oriented Russian nonprofit organizations. To do so, the discussion proceeds in three steps. First, the article documents the considerable scale of the Russian NPO scene as it is visible through the lens of available empirical research. Next, it outlines the key policy measures affecting nonprofit organizations (NPOs) put in place by the Russian government beginning in the latter part of the first decade of the 21st century. Unlike some accounts, however, this one brings into focus both the interesting “tool box” of support programs for NPOs enacted during this period as well as the more restrictive regulatory measures, such as the “foreign agents law,” that also came into force. Finally, the article seeks to unravel the puzzle posed by these apparently competing realities of Russian government policy toward nonprofit organizations by bringing to bear the conceptual lenses that Graham Allison formulated to make sense of the strange series of actions that surrounded the Cuban Missile Crisis a little over 50 years ago. © 2015, International Society for Third-Sector Research and The Johns Hopkins University.
Much existing analysis of Russian state–society relations focuses on public, active forms of contention such as the “opposition” and protest movements. There is need for a more holistic perspective which adds study of a range of overt, “co-opted”, and hidden forms of interaction to this focus on public contention. A theoretical and empirical basis for understanding state–society relations in today's Russia involves broadening the concept of “contentious politics” to include models of “consentful” as well as “dissentful” contention. A diffused model of contentious politics can situate claim-making along the axes of consentful and dissentful motivations, and compliant and contentious behaviours.
Following the protest demonstrations of the 2011-2012 electoral cycle, tensions between the limited modernization efforts of Medvedev and the resurgent authoritarianism of Putin have become increasingly manifest. These are seen not only in the relationship between society and the state, but also in the “para-constitutional” institutions of the dual state. This article argues that whereas Medvedev created an arena for liberalization within these para-constitutional structures, Putin has firmly rejected these policies, among other things by revising the 1995 law on NGOs amended in 2006. Using the perspective of the dual state, the article argues that with the introduction of the Law on Foreign Agents (2012), the original law draft On Public Control (2014), a key element in Medvedev's modernization program, was delayed and substantially altered. Together, these amendments create precarious conditions for NGOs, pressuring their independence by threats of dissolution and reducing the quality of civil control over state organs.
List of cartoons List of figures and tables Acknowledgements Introduction 1. Blat: the unknown phenomenon 2. Understanding blat 3. The Soviet order: a view from within 4. The use of personal networks 5.Blat as a form of exchange: between gift and commodity 6. Networking in the post-Soviet period Appendix Bibliography Index.
The state plays an important role in structuring and channeling civic activism in Russia. Rather than eliminating advocacy, it privileges the advocacy forms that it prefers. The larger challenge facing Russian NGOs is an apathetic public.
The passing of the Russian NGO Law in mid-2006 set clear parameters for Russian NGO activity and civil society development. In this paper we assess the impact of the NGO Law on both NGOs and Russian civil society. Our findings illustrate that the NGO Law has led to a reduction in NGO activity and curtailment of civil society development. We conclude that Russian civil society appears to be dominated by groups funded and thus controlled by the state. This has implications for Russia's on-going democratic development.
This article advances the argument that security integration is occurring in the European Union (EU) as a result of the influence of certain knowledge-based networks or epistemic communities. Given that EU member-states consistently resist integration in areas that are central to traditional state sovereignty, security integration presents a puzzle. The case of the EU Military Committee (EUMC) will serve as an example of how and why epistemic communities matter in security decision-making. Although the EUMC and the Common Security and Defence Policy are relatively new, the power of shared expertise among high-level military officers has already begun to dismantle sovereign barriers to security integration. In considering the puzzle of security integration, this article suggests that the epistemic community framework provides a better explanation for the emergence of a European security space than alternative arguments, such as principal-agent theory, intergovernmental bargaining, and regime theory. The case of a military epistemic community also serves to broaden the epistemic community literature, which tends to focus somewhat narrowly on cases of environmental and economics experts.
This article offers and evaluates a theoretical framework for the appraisal of the third sector's evolution in Russia. Its history in the preceding 50 years is presented as a successive change of three models—latent growth, import-dependent and rooted—each regarded in four dimensions: developmental driving forces, sector structure, dominant organizational culture and relations with the state. The character and change of models are explained proceeding from the demand/supply characteristics of resources and institutions of the sector. Major attention belongs to the rooted model, which is presently taking shape. This versatile and problem-laden process is analysed on the basis of civil society monitoring conducted with the authors' participation since 2006. This analysis reveals rather intensive import substitution of the resources and institutions of the sector and the emergence of prerequisites for its sustainable development. Their implementation depends, however, on the state of the economic, social and cultural environment and requires elimination of some political obstacles.
The article examines the interconnections between gender, civil society and political citizenship in contemporary Russia. It asks how masculinity, femininity and their interrelationships are represented in the context of socio-political activity and what kind of gendered agency these representations construct. The analysis is based on interviews with socially and politically active persons in Central Russia. The main argument in the article is that political space, agency and citizenship in Russia tend to be polarized along gender lines: civic activity is associated with femininity, while institutional politics is considered a masculine territory, and these spheres are represented as quite distinct from each other.
This article investigates the conditions under which epistemic communities define the preferences of European Union (EU) policy-makers. The paper examines how one epistemic community, using the critical loads approach, has influenced EU acid rain policy.The article contends that actors seeking to change EU policy must pursue collective entrepreneurship. Epistemic communities can provide such entrepreneurship, but they only operate in very defined circumstances.
How have environmental movements and organisations evolved in the two decades since the end of state socialism? Focusing upon how the impact of external forces, the core debates concern how changing political opportunities and access to resources as a consequence of European Union accession have impacted on environmental NGOs, as well as the effects more generally of contentious transnational assistance and tutelage offered to local activist networks by US and west European donors. Theoretical and conceptual debates regarding dependency and co-option, versus channelling and new governance, are examined. Have environmental actors and movements in these transitional states and new democracies aligned with the trajectory predicted by scholars 20 years ago? To what extent have longstanding environmental values, modes of political engagement and submerged networks buffered and even transmuted the impact? Why, and to what extent, do the movements and organisations of the region retain a distinctive character and profile?
The article assesses civil society in Putin’s Russia through the lens of the small social movement working against gender violence. Based on questionnaires distributed to movement organizations in 2008–2009, we find significant retrenchment among the NGO segment of the movement, adding evidence to the claim of Russia’s turn toward authoritarianism. However, this innovative, midlevel analysis--not the typical society-wide surveys nor the small number participant observation--also shows that the women’s crisis center movement has made some in-roads in transforming the state, revealing that some democratic opportunities remain at the local level.
Climate change is unusual compared with most environmental issues in the extent to which it has become accepted among orthodox policy institutions and public-and private-sector organizations. The authors explore the conditions that have led to the establishment of an epistemic community that brings together a broad array of actors, including the various NGOs, and the operational dimensions that define the participation of NGOs within the community. An epistemic community does not imply conformity of opinion or approach but allows for differentiation in terms of how its members construct the problem, and their objectives, core beliefs and favoured responses to climate change. Three broad styles of engagement through which NGOs contribute to this debate are identified: developing creative policy solutions, knowledge construction, and lobbying or campaigning. It should be noted that the authors refer primarily to development or environmental NGOs (ENGOs), though they do discuss business NGOs at a few points.
This article examines how women's non-governmental organizations (NGOs) were targeted as an important component of the democracy building and civil society promotion programs of the post-socialist period. In particular, it focuses on NGO organizing around the issue of domestic violence in Armenia. It argues that the framing of the problem along with the proposed solutions led to civil society resistance to and critique of the anti-domestic violence campaign. It considers both the causes and the implications of this resistance on organizing around domestic violence as well as the responses and adaptations of the NGOs involved in the campaign.
This article, drawing upon three approaches from comparative political science, compares domestic violence politics in Russia with Ukraine, Moldova, and Armenia. It suggests that foreign assistance, not without unintended consequences, holds the best promise for initiating reform. It also shows that there is nothing particular about Russian culture that limits reform, especially, as activists can manipulate gender neo-traditionalism. Finally, the study suggests that institutionalized political channels for considering women's issues can facilitate feminist policy-making when pushed by an autonomous women's movement. In conclusion, the article suggests that studying gender politics in non-Western contexts requires integrating comparative with international theories.