Russia’s State Rebuilding Strategy

In the Soviet-Russian case, political transition was not a single process but two simultaneous ones: state rebuilding and political transition. The form and outcome of political transition depended to a great extent on the initial scale of state power loss and on the strategies and results of state rebuilding. When the state did not face a survival crisis and its power remained relatively secure and stable, political transition had greater room to develop. But when the state faced a survival crisis and its institutions were themselves defective, political transition could still occur, though its chances of success were sharply reduced and it could further aggravate the crisis and institutional weaknesses the state already faced. For such states, state rebuilding was a necessity, while political transition was optional. State rebuilding was the primary goal of reform; political transition was closer to a by-product. When the two came into conflict, the goals of political transition were compromised and could even be abandoned altogether. As Tsygankov suggests, once a regime senses threats to its survival, rulers turn toward stronger mobilization and control; only under relatively stable conditions, and in the absence of acute survival pressures, does a regime become more likely to relax its grip on elites and society (Tsygankov 2014).