Economic Crisis, the Power Vertical, and Prospects for Liberalization in Russia

Economic and financial crises can spur major political change as well as policy adjustments. Those with an exogenous source, such as the 2008-09 crisis, can be unanticipated and introduce into the existing domestic context an external ‘surprise’ that the system has few resources to cope with. This chapter explores potential effects of the 2008–09 crisis on political relations in Russia, with the goal of assessing whether it produced an impetus for liberalizing reform.