The dual role of state capacity in opening socio-political orders: assessment of different elements of state capacity in Belarus and Ukraine
Journal: East European Politics
Year: 2020

&lt;p&gt;State capacity declines with democratization, yet high state capacity supports the stability of both democracies and autocracies. Ukraine has been a paradigmatic example of capacity decline in democratization and Belarus of an authoritarian regime with high capacity. We set out to discover which aspects of state capacity might contribute to opening or stability. Conceptualizing capacity as containing administrative, informational and public service aspects, we compare the two countries