"Studying Institutions and Development in Russia: New Data and New Approaches"

On June 26 and 27, 2013 the International Center for the Study of Institutions and Development conducted conference "Studying Institutions and Development in Russia: New Data and New Approaches" on which presented results of the activity on the project "Institutions and economic development: role of bureaucracy and experiments as a method of the analysis and an assessment of reforms" within which use of new methodological approaches of the modern political economy, based on new empirical data on Russia was developed. Besides the staff of the Center the invited academic experts took active part in conference: Daniel Treisman (UCLA), Byung-Yeon Kim (Seoul National University), Galina Belokurova (University of Wisconsin-Madison), Lev Yakobson (HSE), Konstantin Sonin* (NES), Ella Paneyakh (European University at Saint-Petersburg) and others.

Within "Regional Elite of the 2000s" session under the chairmanship of professor Daniel Treysman reports of employees of CSID of John Reuter (CSID, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee) and Timothy Frye (CSID, Columbia University) "The Political Economy of Russian Gubernatorial Election and Appointment", and also "Cancellation of Mayoral Elections in the Russian Cities: Consequences for the Local Elites" by John Reuter and Noah Buckley (CSID, Columbia University) were made. During both reports issues of dependence of regional elite selection mechanisms on their behavior and economic and political situation both on regional, and local levels were brought up.

Within "How Politics Influences Transfers and Investment" session under the chairmanship of the professor Byung-Yeon Kim in reports "Substituting Growth for Money: Intergovernmental Transfers and Electoral Support in the Russian Federation, 2000-2008" by Israel Marques (CSID, Columbia Unversity) and Eugenia Nazrullayeva (CSID), "School of Hard Knocks: Economic Shocks, Transfers, and Strategic Priorities in Hybrid Regimes" by Timothy Frye, Israel Marques and Eugenia Nazrullaeva and "Policy Unfamiliarity: Political Uncertainty and Private Investment in Hybrid Regimes" by David Szakonyi (CSID, Columbia Unversity) and Eugenia Nazrullaeva questions of various aspects of investment and distributive policy in regions, interdependence of investments and a transfers (both state, and private) from an economic situation and political uncertainty were discussed.

Within "Collective Action, Informal Ties and Influence" session under the chairmanship of Victor Polterovich (NES) reports "Getting Friendly with the Boss: Political Consolidation, Personal Connections, and the Choice of Lobbying Strategy" by Andrey Govorun (IIMS HSE), Israel Marques and William Pyle  (Middlebury College), "Judicial Alignment and Criminal Justice: Evidence from Russian Courts" by Andre Schultz (Frankfurt School of Finance and Management), Vladimir Kozlov (HSE), Alexander Libman (Frankfurt School of Finance and Management) were presented. In both reports the subject of the importance of informal communications for the Russian economic and political life was stressed - in the context of  lobbying strategies and process of criminal trial correspondingly.

Within session "Police and Society" under the chairmanship of professor Timothy Fr were brought up questions of relationship of citizens of Russia and the Russian police. So, Noah Buckley (ICSID-HSE, Columbia University), Timothy Frye (ICSID-HSE, Columbia University), Scott Gehlbach (ICSID-HSE, University of Wisconsin-Madison), Lauren McCarthy (University of Massachusetts-Amherst) brought up a question of the importance of major factors and the price of cooperation of citizens with police. Alexey Belyanin's report "Legal Conscience and Trust to Police" noted dependence of overall performance of police on sense of justice of citizens. Lauren McCarthy with the report "Local Level Law Enforcement: Muscovites and their Uchastkovyi" noted features of the relation of the population to institute of local police officers as main level of interaction of police and citizens. Ella Paneyakh (The European university in St. Petersburg) in the report "Faking Performance Together: Systems of Performance Evaluation in Russian Enforcement Agencies and Their Interaction Effect on Processing of a Criminal Case" drew conclusions on an autonomy of law enforcement agencies that turns law-enforcement process into the instrument of manipulations and prosecution by employees of own interests.

Within Business and Law session under the chairmanship of the NES professor Konstantin Sonin reports "Criminal Persecution of Business in Russian Regions: the Role of State Violence? " Eugenia Nazrullaeva and Alexey Baranov (CSID) and "Corporate Raiding and the Role of the State in Russia" by Michael Rochlitz (IMT Lucca). Within these reports such questions of problems of relationship of business and law-enforcement system as criminal prosecution of business and communication of criminal cases with "baculine" system of the reporting of law-enforcement bodies both corporate raiding and its interrelation with a political situation in the region were considered.

Finally, within conference the round table on the subject "New Regional Elites and Incentives for Economic Development", moderated by the HSE professor Lev Yakobson took place on June 26th. Vladimir Drebentsov (BP), Ksenia Yudaeva (Kremlin Administration), Alexei Lavrov (MinFin), Oleg Fomichev (MoED), Alexander Pirozhenko (ASI), Victor Polterovich (Central Economic-Mathematical Institute of RAS), Andrei Yakovlev (ICSID-HSE), Mikhail Pryadilnikov (Moscow City Government) participated in the discussion.

Conference program 2013

* Константин Сонин включен Минюстом в список физлиц, выполняющих функции иностранного агента