Money, oligarchs and parties in the post-Soviet space

Andreichuk S.V.

Abstract

A review of "Money Rules: Parties, Oligarchs and Funding Regulation in Post-Soviet Countries".

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Attention to the financing of political parties and candidates worldwide has been on a steady increase over the past 30 years. Money is indeed one of the most important resources in politics, so the origin of funds managed by political parties and candidates is of concern to both experts and average voters. The crisis experienced by parties around the world is often attributed to accusations of political corruption and the disconnect between the interests and views of politicians and average voters.

The book edited by Fernando Casal Bertoa and Levan Tsutskiridze [1] attempts to fill the gap in the comparative study of political party financing systems in the post-Soviet space.

That said, the borders of the region are identified in a rather original way: the authors include Mongolia in the post-Soviet space, but leave out the former Baltic republics that became part of the EU. "Region" is always a fairly contingent and subjective construct: in academic and publicistic literature, for example, the boundaries of "Europe" and "Asia", "Eastern" and "Central" Europe, "Siberia" and "the Urals" are repeatedly shifted. The speculative nature of any regional boundaries is also evident in official documents. For example, the Union of European Football Associations includes Israel, Azerbaijan and even Kazakhstan. The boundaries of the region as outlined by the editors of the volume are nevertheless debatable.

To what extent today, 30 years after the collapse of the USSR, is it even possible to talk about a common "post-Soviet space", given what different directions the countries have traveled during this time? Is it reasonable to assume that Tajikistan, Ukraine, Georgia and Russia at the moment of the collapse of the USSR were at the same juncture in terms of socio-political, cultural and economic conditions? Could it turn out that there was less difference between Ukraine, Lithuania and the Czech Republic at that time than between Ukraine and Turkmenistan, let alone Mongolia? The texts compiled in this book only push these questions more into the spotlight, because finding similarities between party systems and party financing rules in these countries is sometimes more difficult than identifying differences.

However, such doubts about the validity of the boundaries of the described region can hardly undermine the main value of this volume - you are unlikely to find another book that describes the evolution of party systems and their financing rules of these 13 countries. Moreover, the article on Mongolia seems to be the first ever to offer such a detailed overview of the development of the country's party system. At least in English, that is.

The book is essentially a collection of articles by leading experts from their respective countries, providing a concise but comprehensive account of these processes. The fact that all the articles follow the same structure adds to its value. This allows you to read the articles not one by one, but to transition between the corresponding sections of the articles on different countries and compare their development trajectories. Alternatively, the volume can be used as a reference book by finding a summary of the main parameters of the party system, the rules of financing or the evolution of parties in each individual country.

Perhaps the main question the editors are trying to answer is: how do party financing rules affect the development of the party system? They answer this question as early as in the opening review article by Fernando Casal Bertoa. And that answer is "It's unclear." Or even "They don't."

One can understand the paradox of this conclusion. Party financing rules are far from being the main factor influencing the development of party systems in countries whose political regimes fall on the spectrum from hard authoritarianism to unstable democracies (or rather defective democracies). The lack of a clear correlation between the quality of legislative regulation of party financing or the availability of public financing and the state of political parties in these countries is well-presented as early as in the first article.

Besides, assessing the quality of the party system is hardly always a simple matter. In an article on Russia, Valeria Tonhäuser and Alexander Kynev make a convincing case that assessing the quality of a party system depends on the assessment parameter one uses.

The compilation provides a large number of practical examples of how certain party and candidate financing rules may affect the party system in different ways in different contexts, and how these rules become ways of dealing with the objectives that different political forces set for themselves in order to create advantages in the political struggle. The book features both failed examples and quite successful ones. This is why anyone interested in this topic will find a great deal of evidence-based material in it.

But, at the same time, it will pose even more questions before the reader. And this, in my opinion, is the editors' greatest achievement.

Received 13.06.2024.

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References

1. Money Rules: Parties, Oligarchs and Funding Regulation in Post-Soviet Countries. Ed. by Fernando Casal Bértoa and Levan Tsutskiridze. New York: Routledge, 2024. 216 p.