In Moscow in the early spring and summer of 1997, a colleague and I asked experts to rate regions according to Dahl's definition of democracy. I conducted a similar survey in Bishkek in May 1997. This appendix describes the selection process for the respondents, the structure of the surveys, the validity and reliability of the results, and the results themselves.

RESPONDENTS

Twenty-six experts in Russia completed the survey, and 23 respondents filled out the questionnaire in Kyrgyzstan. The respondents from Russia included representatives of universities and research centers in Moscow, members of the Russian presidential administration and the Federation Council, and foreign scholars residing in Moscow at the time of the survey. The Kyrgyzstani experts were members of universities and research centers in Bishkek and staff in the administrations of the president and prime minister.

I used a snowball sample to select respondents in each country because there is no defined group of experts on regional politics and, as a group, experts are more difficult to reach than other populations, such as the public. The snowball sample was generated as follows: I worked with a local scholar of regional politics in each country to create an initial list of regional experts, and in the questionnaires I then asked respondents to suggest additional experts. My colleagues and I distributed the survey to those recommended according to a number of conditions.

“My wife asked me to not be involved in politics so that I could feed our family,” a middle-aged man in the former Soviet Union recounted to me in 1997. This simple, pragmatic statement reveals a fundamental way in which capitalism influences democracy. Specifically, capitalism acts on democracy through individuals' assessments of their economic autonomy, or their ability to earn a living independent of the state. With the end of Soviet communism in 1991, this man became actively involved in democratic politics. He founded a branch of a political party, which supported candidates for regional and national elections. “When I created the party, I did not think there would be risks,” he explained. He had assumed that greater political freedom in the late Soviet period meant that he no longer had to fear government reprisals for oppositional activity. He was wrong. Provincial authorities fired this man from his job as a school director three times between 1991 and 1997 as punishment for his political activism. Meanwhile, his organization dwindled from 100 to 12 members as others faced similar workplace harassment. Unable to find a job beyond the reach of local officials, the man decided to abandon the party. He and his fellow leaders dissolved the organization, even though the party was thriving in other regions of the country.

This story is typical of the accounts I heard from current and former activists in post-Soviet countries.

The third wave of democratization – beginning in 1974 with a military coup in Portugal and washing over much of Latin America, Asia, Africa, and the Eastern bloc during the next two decades – raised expectations among scholars, activists, and journalists that democracy would flourish in regions outside of Western Europe and North America. Political leaders in third wave countries had circumvented socioeconomic conditions not conducive to democratic development by opting to dismantle old regimes and craft new political institutions. Yet, in the 21st century, our euphoria over these extractions from authoritarianism has dissipated as many of these new governments have shown themselves to be hybrid regimes; in other words, they combine elements of democracy and authoritarianism. Nearly half of all countries worldwide can be characterized as having hybrid regimes. Typically, these regimes hold elections without guaranteeing the civil liberties that make electoral outcomes accurate expressions of citizens' preferences.

Why have hybrid regimes proliferated? The concept of economic autonomy and the model of interaction developed in this book offer some clues. Interventionist states had developed in many of the third wave countries by the time democratic institutions were introduced there. The emergence of interventionist states robbed citizens of their economic autonomy and thus enabled governments to more easily harass their opponents. The interaction among components of democracy compounded the problem by allowing government officials to undermine entire nascent democracies through the restriction of only a few civil liberties.

Chapter 2 considers the influence of interests, resources, and organizational capacity relative to economic autonomy. This appendix considers four other alternative explanations – political opportunity structures, institutions, leadership, and international promotion of democracy. Unlike economic autonomy, none account for the greater degree of self-censorship and government harassment in Ul'ianovsk and Naryn.

POLITICAL OPPORTUNITY STRUCTURES

Scholars have argued that political changes, such as increased access to government institutions and new alliances with government officials, can encourage people to become politically involved. Clearly, by harassing activists, local authorities are not sending the message that they want citizens to be involved in politics. Yet, harassment cannot explain self-censorship in Ul'ianovsk and Naryn. As Chapter 4 enumerates, government punishments in Ul'ianovsk are more common than they are in Naryn, yet self-censorship is greater in Naryn. Moreover, government harassment cannot account for the fact that a few individuals in Naryn nonetheless do challenge local authorities.

INSTITUTIONS

Institutions are often cited as possible influences on democratic development in the former Soviet Union. Institutional theories hypothesize that reformers can design laws regulating elections, legislatures, and other components of democracy in order to enhance the long-term success of this form of government. However, laws regulating activism are too similar in the provinces of each country to account for the differences in officials' and activists' behaviors.

Table C.1 provides a list of the interviews I conducted. In addition to the groups noted in the table, I spoke with businesspeople and average citizens. I interviewed businesspeople who were activists, and they are included in the appropriate categories in the table. I also had informal conversations with other businesspeople who were not activists but whom I met while I lived in each region. Similarly, I spoke with average citizens, such as members of the families with whom I lived and their neighbors and friends. I did not enumerate these conversations with businesspeople or average citizens.