Redistributive Politics in Russia: The Political Economy of Agricultural Subsidies
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Redistributive Politics in Russia: The Political Economy of Agricultural Subsidies Vasyl Kvartiuk1 · Thomas Herzfeld1,2
© The Author(s) 2020
Abstract This paper explores whether redistributive politics can explain differences in agricultural subsidies in Russia, a country whose autocratic regime represents a fertile ground for strategic redistribution. Relying on political economy literature, we examine the strategies regional and federal Russian politicians utilize to allocate and distribute agricultural subsidies. Using unique 2008–2015 panel data, we test whether politicians target loyal or easily swayed voters and whether they use large farms as vote brokers. We find federal and regional politicians to allocate more agricultural subsidies when political competition against the dominant party is higher. Moreover, they appear to also target large farms for voter mobilization. Keywords Agricultural subsidies · Redistribution · Political competition · Vote brokers · Russia JEL Classification D72 · H77 · H23 · P16
Introduction Although Russia spends large amounts of resources to support its agricultural sector, not all farms benefit from these funds because allocation and distribution are highly unequal among the regions (Uzun 2005; Uzun et al. 2016). Russia’s self-sufficiency doctrine1 generates large political interest toward agriculture, with 0.93% of the country’s GDP 1 Russia’s food self-sufficiency strategy was first adopted within the country’s 2008−2012 State Program for Development of Agriculture and then developed further by the consequent program for 2013–2020.
* Vasyl Kvartiuk [email protected] Thomas Herzfeld [email protected] 1
Leibniz-Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), Theodor‑Lieser‑Str. 2, 06120 Halle (Saale), Germany
2
Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg, Universitätsplatz 10, 06108 Halle (Saale), Germany
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V. Kvartiuk, T. Herzfeld
allocated toward direct and indirect support (OECD 2017). However, the regions benefit from these resources unequally since the composition of federal and regional2 cofunding differs greatly between the sub-federal units. Subsequently, subsidies per hectare vary substantially across sub-federal units: sometimes we observe 20-fold differences. There could be two main reasons for these imbalances: first, because agricultural support is legally a primary responsibility of the regions (Shagaida et al. 2015) that have a substantial discretion in the size of the co-funding (Uzun et al. 2016), regional economic strength may affect the size of local co-funding. Second, although federal co-funding of agricultural subsidies is regulated by distribution formulas under the country’s current legislation,3 de facto amounts may be substantially different (Frumina 2016). Controlling for the major variables in the distribution formulas and other agricultural economic factors, we still cannot fully explain the differences in agricultural subsidies. In light of the growing scholarly interest in redistributive po
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