Institutional Development: Interpreting the Russian Case

A fundamental question to both historians and development economists is why countries today are able to reach and maintain such starkly different economic outcomes. Popular explanations include geographic and climatological features, short-term policy decisions, and economic institutions. This paper...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Rooney, Joshua W
Format: Others
Published: Scholarship @ Claremont 2017
Subjects:
Online Access:http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/1549
http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2775&context=cmc_theses
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Summary:A fundamental question to both historians and development economists is why countries today are able to reach and maintain such starkly different economic outcomes. Popular explanations include geographic and climatological features, short-term policy decisions, and economic institutions. This paper looks at the importance of violence and social pressure in the transformation and conservation of political and economic institutions in Russia. It finds that several major historical legacies including serfdom, Mongol dominance, Orthodoxy, and authoritarianism significantly influence both the past a present institutional setting. Furthermore, such legacies have proven to be major obstructions to the emergence of economic liberalism.