The first dimension of categorization is the nature of the ruling elite. The interpretative layers and the related state concepts can be seen in Table 2.5. Differentiating state types, we shall rely on the concepts and definitions provided above in Part 2.2.2.2, including, first and foremost, informality, patronalism, and the adopted political family.
Our conceptual starting point is the state led by the ruling elite, possessed of the monopoly of legitimate use of violence. Further categories can be defined as follows:
- Network state is a state where the functions of the state organization are dominated by informal networks of the ruling elite, rather than being institutionalized, formalized, and realized through impersonal relations.
- Patronal state is a network state where the command structure in the informal network is of the patron-client type, that is, featuring hierarchical chains of dependence.
- Clan state is a patronal state where the ruling elite is a clan type of adopted political family, that is, a patronal network of kinship and quasi-kinship relations organized under the patriarchal domination of the chief patron.
From the three consequent adjectives, “network” is the most neutral one. One can even argue it is too neutral—after all, every state contains networks for the members of the ruling elite, and the ruling elite and the state apparatusare obviously connected, too. However, the fact that we do not refer to every state as network state signifies precisely that here “network” refers to a non-trivial feature, that is, something beyond the normal workings of the state. This feature is the informal character of the ruling elite and of the way power is exercised. According to our definition, informality means the lack of a legal and openly admitted form, whereas in a network state we can speak about the dominance of informal institutions over formal ones [→ 2.2.2.2]. As Vadim Kononenko explains in a book which describes Putin’s Russia as a network state, networks should be understood “as a means of social interaction which is less formal than those between and within state institutions […]. [Such] networks can be found both outside the state institutions but also incorporated within […] ministries and administrative hierarchies. In this regard, networks are always personal and link up individuals or groups that share similar interests, allegiances and identification” (emphasis added).[1] Informality signifies the principle of elite interest because it typically means the circumvention of those formal institutions that are in place precisely to defend against elite interest, the exclusive possession of political power [→ 4.4.1] and the abuse of public office for private gain (corruption [→ 5.3]).
It may be argued that informality also involves the element of secrecy, which is necessary for elite interest as it—particularly the wish to accumulate personal wealth—can hardly be admitted to the people (i.e., the voters). But when it comes to informal patronalism, the more general point is that the formal institutional system of a professional Weberian bureaucracy is less suitable to continuous discretional rewards and punishments than informal institutions or commands [→ 3.3.5, 3.6.3]. This leads us to the term “patronal state,” which has been used by Hale for Moldova.[2] Yet our understanding is different from his in the sense that our definition builds on the notion of the network state. Indeed, by the term “patronal,” we refer to a specific kind of informal network, characterized by patron-client relations. As we explained above, these relations are vertical in character and feature a strong element of unconditionality and inequality in power between one person—the patron—and his vassal or subordinate—the client. In short, if the informal network that rules the state is hierarchical and lower-level actors are (informally) subordinated to and dependent on higher-level actors, we can speak about a patronal state [→ 2.2.2.2].
| 2.2. Box: The general character of clans. “[…] a clan is an informal organization comprising a network of individuals linked by kin and fictive kin identities. These affective ties comprise the identity and bonds of its organization. Kinship ties are rooted in the extensive family organization that characterized society in this region and in historically tribal societies. ‘Fictive kinship’ ties go beyond blood ties and incorporate individuals into the network through marriage, family alliances, school ties, localism […], and neighborhood […] and village […]. As anthropologists and historians have often noted, clans are common in tribal […] regions and in collectivist cultures. [In clans] actual blood ties do not always exist; more important than the objective reality of kinship is the subjective sense of identity and the use of the norms of kinship – such as in-group reciprocity and loyalty – to bind the group and protect its members. […] [T]he clan’s boundaries, while not fixed and unchanging, are difficult to permeate. Individuals cannot easily enter or exit a clan […]. Clans typically cross class lines.” – Kathleen Collins, Clan Politics and Regime Transition in Central Asia (Cambridge University Press, 2006), 17–18. |
The notion of “clan state” has been popularized by Janine Wedel,[3] although her description—an informal elite group that operates in the multiple domains of politics, economics and law and blurs public and private spheres accordingly—exhausts the definition of network state only.[4] Putting two further interpretative layers on it, we define a network which is not simply (1) informal but also (2) patronal and (3) its members are linked via kinship and quasi-kinship ties in a “clan” (see Box 2.2). Thus, a “clan state” is a state run by a clan, that is, an informal patronal network characterized by kinship and quasi-kinship ties [→ 3.6.2.1]. In the post-communist region, we refer to such clans as adopted political families, because the combination of patron-client relations and kinship and quasi-kinship ties are naturally followed by the anthropological character of an extended patriarchal family. Weber captures the patriarchal family in its traditional form, and one of the primary characteristic features he observes is patriarchal domination. As he writes, under patriarchal domination “the legitimacy of the master’s orders is guaranteed by personal subjection, and only the fact and the limits of his power of control are derived from ‘norms,’ yet these norms are not enacted but sanctified by traditions. […] The master wields his power without restraint, at his own discretion and, above all, unencumbered by rules […]. [The] belief of authority is based on personal relations that are perceived as natural.”[5] This model of patriarchal domination or “personal rule”[6] can be observed in several informal patronal networks in the post-communist region, although the primary binder of a clan can be several other things besides tradition. Indeed, a clan can be grounded in at least four things: (a) ethnicity, (b) nomenklatura past (that is, past membership in the communist ruling elite), (c) party and (d) fraternity.[7] Other important ties include family relationships, as well as the adopted family sealed by businesses in common. In several post-communist ruling elites, the adoption of a client consecrates neither an organizational ethos nor ties of blood or actual kinship, in keeping with a large family cultural pattern, but of loyalty towards the head of the family, the chief patron [→ 3.6.2.4].
[1] Kononenko, “Introduction,” 6.
[2] Hale, Patronal Politics, 165–74.
[3] Weber also used the expression “clan state” (Geschlechterstaat) in his writing, but in a different context and with a different definition. See Weber, Economy and Society, 250.
[4] Wedel, “Corruption and Organized Crime in Post-Communist States”; Wedel, “Clans, Cliques and Captured States.”
[5] Weber, Economy and Society, 1006–7.
[6] Guliyev, “Personal Rule, Neopatrimonialism, and Regime Typologies.”
[7] Cf. Wedel, “Corruption and Organized Crime in Post-Communist States,” 48–49.