Siberian Federal University

Issue

Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences. 2024 17 (3)

Authors

Sablin, Kirill S.; Kislitsyn, Dmitry V.

Contact information

Sablin, Kirill S. : Kemerovo State University Kemerovo, Russian Federation; Russian State Institute of Performing Arts St. Petersburg, Russian Federation; ; ORCID: 0000-0002-5478-7481; Kislitsyn, Dmitry V.: National Research University – Higher School of Economics St. Petersburg, Russian Federation

Keywords

political connections; economic markets; top entrepreneurs; approaches to measuring political connections; quantification of political connections

Abstract

The article considers political connections of top entrepreneurs as a special resource that guarantees privileged access to the means of production and provides competitive advantages on the economic markets. They accumulate political connections both in the countries with developed economies as well as in the countries with emerging markets. In the latter case, entrepreneurs exploit this resource directly for the purpose to design institutional environment favorable for firms’ performance. Different approaches are identified those allow measuring the magnitude of political connections. Their advantages and disadvantages are revealed. An approach is proposed that involves the use of measure of political connection that is unique for contemporary Russia. This approach is associated with the presence of personal sanctions imposed on the Russian entrepreneurs in 2014 and 2022. The motivation for the imposition of sanctions was due to the fact that they were introduced against entrepreneurs of the “inner circle” who could impact the political decision-making process. In this sense, the presence of personal sanctions can be seen as a proxy for the political connections. The analysis showed that top entrepreneurs who were sanctioned in 2014 are statistically significantly different from entrepreneurs who were included in the sanction lists in 2022. The first group of entrepreneurs was very narrow and it included “confidant persons” of the ruling group. The second group of entrepreneurs was characterized by a combination of personal ties with political leadership and significant investments in establishing links with the political and economic elites of the Western countries. This combination provided the highest return on the exploitation of political connections

Pages

540–549

EDN

IPERFP

Paper at repository of SibFU

https://elib.sfu-kras.ru/handle/2311/152709

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0).