{"id":1065,"date":"2020-03-10T09:47:55","date_gmt":"2020-03-10T13:47:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/?p=1065"},"modified":"2022-01-19T08:27:36","modified_gmt":"2022-01-19T12:27:36","slug":"do-or-die-governance-the-weaponization-of-corruption-in-russia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/2020\/03\/10\/do-or-die-governance-the-weaponization-of-corruption-in-russia\/","title":{"rendered":"Do or Die Governance: The Weaponization of Corruption in Russia"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"
Dmitry Firtash. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By Quinn Riley<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Monday, March 2, the Havighurst Center for Russian and\nPost-Soviet welcomed Dr. Timothy Model, Havighurst\nTeaching Fellow and Visiting Assistant Professor, to the spring colloquia\nseries. In a lecture titled \u201cRussia\u2019s Weaponization of Corruption in Ukraine,\u201d Model\nexplored Russia\u2019s use of corruption as a form of hybrid warfare in a\npost-Soviet geopolitical space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Russia is often noted for its high-profile foreign and domestic\nengagements; the downing of Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 in Ukraine, the\nannexation of Crimea in 2014, and questionable news stories televised by\nstate-controlled media are a few of the most memorable. These events and\nactions pertain, more broadly, to Russia\u2019s weaponization of weapons,\ninformation, and oil. Against this backdrop, Model advanced an additional\ncomponent in Russia\u2019s repertoire of weaponization: corruption. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Model defined Russia\u2019s government as a \u201ccaptured autocracy,\u201d\nmeaning a system without free and competitive elections that has been \u201ccaptured\nby a small group of people with a substantial control over assets in the\ncountry.\u201d He finds that corruption in these systems is actually a tool of\ngovernance as opposed to an activity of individuals within government. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Corruption in Russia is systematic, carefully managed and\ndeliberately designed. Exchanges between members of the Russian government and\nelites all over the world are conducted in a complex, international network\nthat is, in many ways, dangerous to its own participants. Model described the\nmethods of creating a network of corruption as different variations of\nrecruitment, usage and maintenance. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Networks of corruption require the recruitment of individuals for\nwhom loyalty can be negotiated, bribed or forced. These recruits are used to\nachieve domestic, ideological, foreign policy and economic goals; however,\nnetworks of corruption are sustained through maintenance. Maintenance of assets\nis critical to the survival of the network due to the information that recruits\nlearn by virtue of their participation. Model emphasized two prominent\nindividuals that serve the corrupt network Russia uses as a tool of governance:\nDmytro Firtash and Oksana Marchenko.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Firtash is the owner of business conglomerate Group DF, which has\na major stake in banking, media, and raw material industries from Ukraine with\ndirect connections to the Russian government. He is the former owner of\nRosUkrEnergo, the gas company that ultimately garnered a leading role in the\nRussia-Ukraine gas trade after Russia hiked Ukraine\u2019s gas prices five times the\noriginal amount in 2006. Due to Firtash\u2019s distinct relationship with Russia, he\nhas frequently served as an intermediary between Russia and Ukraine, lobbying\non behalf of Russia\u2019s economic and political agendas in Ukraine. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oksana Marchenko is a well-known television personality and social\nmedia influencer in Ukraine. Marchenko became the owner of a plethora of well-known\nshell companies previously owned by her husband Victor Medvedchuk before he\nfell victim to U.S. sanctions. Medvedchuk is a Ukrainian oligarch and\nPro-Russian politician with a major stake in a Russian oil field. His ties to\nthe Kremlin are both visible and deeply personal, as President Putin and his\nwife are the godparents of Medvedchuk\u2019s daughter. Additionally, in his role as\nChief of Staff to former Ukrainian President Kuchma, Medvedchuk played an\nintegral role in rewriting the Ukrainian constitution. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These individuals don\u2019t pose exceptions to Russia\u2019s style of\ngovernance- they are the rule and they exist alongside hundreds if not\nthousands of compatriots within the Russian network of overt and covert\ncorruption. The stakes are equally high for both Russia and its pawns; while\nthe benefits of engaging in these channels of corruption are substantial and\nimmediate, there are serious dangers posed by leaving the network, not\nexcluding threats to one’s friends and family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Russia prioritizes the maintenance of its sphere of influence by whatever means necessary. This often amounts to unimaginable violence, political instability, propagandized information and economic inequality being lived realities for Russian and Ukrainian people. Ultimately, regional and global superpower status are strategic objectives for Russia as a nation, and the weaponization of corruption is central to achieving these goals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Quinn Riley is a first-year M.A. student in Political Science.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Quinn Riley On Monday, March 2, the Havighurst Center for Russian and Post-Soviet welcomed Dr. Timothy Model, Havighurst Teaching Fellow and Visiting Assistant Professor, to the spring colloquia series. In a lecture titled \u201cRussia\u2019s Weaponization of Corruption in Ukraine,\u201d … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":781,"featured_media":1066,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"gallery","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_s2mail":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-gallery","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colloquium-talks","category-lecture_reviews","post_format-post-format-gallery"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/781"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1065\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/havighurst\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}