How did Putin use reshuffling within the law enforcement to entrench himself in office? More broadly, how does reorientation of loyalties of personnel in legal institutions contribute to democratic backsliding? This project examines the micro-foundations of democratic erosion and authoritarian state building focusing on the strategic management of personnel of the law enforcement on the subnational level. Existing scholarship has demonstrated ways in which agent shuffling can help authoritarian incumbents get reelected. The study builds on scholarship in this area and shows that agent shuffling in the law enforcement can help build core authoritarian institutions, such as a dominant authoritarian party, while simultaneously unraveling the existing democratic institutions, such as federalism, by making the law enforcement agents independent from local elites. To test this theory, the project relies on an original biographical dataset tracking personnel changes in Russian Procuracy on the subnational level as well as detailed case-studies of regions of Russia. Using the dataset, I demonstrate that agent shuffling in the Procuracy was strategic and served authoritarian regime building. Subnational case-studies help verify the incentives of the actors and establish the mechanisms through which personnel shuffling contributed to democratic erosion in Russia.  

Biography:

Evgenia Olimpieva is a doctoral candidate in Political Science at the University of Chicago specializing in comparative politics and political methodology. Her research interests revolve around the topics of democratic backsliding and authoritarian institutionalization with a focus on the institutions of law enforcement and the judiciary. She holds a Bachelor of Arts from St. John’s College and an MA from Master of Arts Program in the Social Sciences (MAPSS) at the University of Chicago.