Politics for Profit: Business, Elections, and Policymaking in Russia

Politics for Profit: Business, Elections, and Policymaking in Russia
Contents
List of Figures
List of Tables
Acknowledgments
Introduction
	Businesspeople in Elected Office Worldwide
	Businessperson Candidacy as Non-Market Strategy
	Puzzle and Theoretical Framework
		Argument
		Testing the Argument
		Deciding How to Run
	Businessperson Rent-Seeking and Policymaking
		Firm-Level Benefits from Businessperson Candidacy
		Businesspeople as Policymakers
	The Case of Russia
	Contributions to the Literature
1 A Theory of Businessperson Candidacy
	1.1 Indirect Strategies: Political Access through Intermediaries
		1.1.1 Campaign Contributions
		1.1.2 Lobbying
	1.2 Direct Strategies
		1.2.1 Bringing Politicians On Board
		1.2.2 Becoming Bureaucrats
		1.2.3 Businessperson Candidacy
			How Businessperson Candidacy Helps Firms
			Deputy Requests
			Financial and Opportunity Costs of Running for Office
	1.3 How Firms Choose Between Indirect and Direct Strategies
		1.3.1 Why do Politicians Shirk?
		1.3.2 The Drawbacks of Conventional Solutions
	1.4 Businessperson Candidacy Solves the Commitment Problem
		1.4.1 Economic Competition and Political Rivalry
		1.4.2 The Constraining Effects of Strong Political Parties
		1.4.3 Campaign Costs and Candidate Entry
		1.4.4 An Ability to Pay
	1.5 Alternative Explanations for Businessperson Candidacy
		1.5.1 Quality of Democracy
		1.5.2 Collective Action by Trade Associations, Alliances, and Business-Led Political Parties
		1.5.3 Personal Characteristics of Office-Seekers
	1.6 Discussion and Concluding Remarks
2 Identifying Businesspeople Who Run for Office
	2.1 Defining Businessperson Candidacy
		2.1.1 A Brief History of Businesspeople in Russian Politics
			Why Focus on Regional Legislatures?
		2.1.2 Regional Legislative Elections
		2.1.3 Connecting Candidates with Firms
		2.1.4 Descriptive Statistics: Candidate Level
		2.1.5 Descriptive Statistics: Firm Level
			The Case of State-Owned Enterprises
	2.2 Discussion and Concluding Remarks
3 Economic Competition, Weak Parties, and Businessperson Candidacy
	3.1 Determinants of Businessperson Candidacy: Firm Registration Data
		3.1.1 Variable Measurement
		3.1.2 Empirical Strategy
		3.1.3 Firm-Level Empirical Results
		3.1.4 Region-Level Empirical Results
	3.2 Evidence from a Firm Survey
	3.3 Qualitative Data
	3.4 Discussion and Concluding Remarks
4 Choosing Ballots, Parties, and Delegates
	4.1 Choosing a Ballot
		4.1.1 How Businesspeople Choose between Ballots
		4.1.2 Data and Empirical Strategy
		4.1.3 Empirical Results
	4.2 Choosing a Party
		4.2.1 Party Membership in Putin-Era Russia
		4.2.2 How Businesspeople Choose Between Parties
		4.2.3 Data and Empirical Strategy
		4.2.4 Empirical Results
		4.2.5 Do Parties Coordinate Sectoral Interests?
	4.3 Selecting a Firm Representative
		4.3.1 Data and Empirical Strategy
		4.3.2 Empirical Results
	4.4 Discussion and Concluding Remarks
5 Firm-Level Returns from Businessperson Candidacy
	5.1 Returns to Corporate Political Activity
	5.2 Data and Research Design
		5.2.1 Data Description
		5.2.2 Regression Discontinuity Design
		5.2.3 Balance Checks
	5.3 RDD Results
	5.4 Causal Mechanisms
	5.5 Heterogeneous Treatment Effects
	5.6 Discussion and Concluding Remarks
6 Businesspeople as Policymakers
	6.1 Demographic Determinants of Policymaking
		6.1.1 Adopting Pro-Business Policies
			Improving Government Efficiency
	6.2 Data and Research Design
		6.2.1 Measuring Private Sector Experience
		6.2.2 Outcome Data
		6.2.3 Research Design and Balance Checks
	6.3 Empirical Results
		6.3.1 Robustness: Spending by Regional Legislatures
	6.4 Concluding Remarks
7 Conclusion and Policy Recommendations
	7.1 Taking the Arguments to the Road
	7.2 Designing Effective Policy
		7.2.1 Cooling-Off versus Moonlighting
		7.2.2 Divesting Assets
		7.2.3 Mandating Transparency and Calling Citizens to Action
Appendix
	A Data Sources
		A.1 Introduction to SPARK Database
		A.2 Description of Algorithm
		A.3 Data Quality and Limitations
	B Chapter 2: Descriptive Statistics
		B.1 Descriptive Statistics
	C Chapter 3: Robustness Checks
		C.1 Firm Registration Data: Extensions
		C.2 Candidate Data
	D Chapter 4: Robustness Checks
		D.1 Party Choice: All Candidates
	E Chapter 5: Robustness Checks
		E.1 Digging into the Democracy Mechanism
	F Chapter 6: Descriptive Statistics and Robustness Checks
		F.1 Descriptive Statistics: Overview of Regional and Municipal Spending
		F.2 Municipality Level: Other Outcome Variables
		F.3 Region Level: Other Outcome Variables
		F.4 Public Opinion Data on Businesspeople’s Preferences: Life in Transition Survey
Bibliography
Index
Back Matter