CONFLICT UNDER HYBRID POLITICAL REGIMES: THE CASE OF RUSSIA

Abstract

Th e article deals with the forms of confl ict development and confl ict management under diff erent types of political regime. Th e relationship of political practices working with confl ict and specifi c confl ict interactions with the form of the regime are examined in the text. Th ere is an attempt to identify the characteristics of hybrid political regimes and analyze their characteristics in terms of confl ict theory. Authors show multilayered confl icts in modern Russian society, caused by the such essential features of hybrid political regime as an imitation of democratic institutions under the authoritarian model of political governance. On the basis of the methodological tools of confl ict analysis in free societies and rigid political systems proposed by L. Coser, the features of confl ict management in hybrid regime are shown. Th ese regimes are characterized by secondary role of formal institutions of confl ict management with overlapping functions. Th ere are shown features of the political, ideological and symbolic construction of the ideology of stability and "confl ict-free world". On the base of this ideology confl ict is a source of violations of established power of the social order. Th e authors analyze the Russian mechanisms for maintaining political order and technologies to prevent and resolve confl icts. During the analysis of the Russian hybrid political regime confl ict model particular attention is paid to such analytical parameters of national values as a means of confl ict solving, including the control of aggression and symbolic violence directed at suppressing the confl ict beyond the institutional framework. It is proved that the Russian political practice is implemented in the base model of creating an artifi cial political contentiousness as a social norm. Th is will marginalize management practices and procedures to eliminate system confl icts and delays critical decisions on the confl icting reality adjustment. Refs 45.

Keywords:

Russia, hybrid political regime, power, confl ict, political order, stability