Putinism and Modern Authoritarianism: Governance, Society, and War

Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine has renewed attention to authoritarian politics, but it also raises a deeper question: how do modern authoritarian regimes maintain stability while undertaking high-risk policies. This course examines the political system commonly described as Putinism and uses it as a framework for understanding contemporary authoritarian governance. It begins with the war in Ukraine and introduces competing explanations of Russian behavior, including geopolitical, leadership-centered, and institutional perspectives. The course then provides the historical and institutional foundations needed to evaluate these explanations. Students analyze how the Russian regime combines centralized political control with delegated governance across regions, economic actors, and civil society. Key topics include the power vertical, patronal networks, conditional property rights, managed participation, and informational control. In the final part of the course, students return to the war as a stress test of the system, evaluating how wartime pressures affect regime stability, civic life, and economic governance. The course emphasizes the application of theoretical concepts to real-world developments and encourages students to critically engage with competing interpretations of Russian politics.