State Clientelism Today: A Case Study of Belarus
Journal: Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) (Harvard University)
Year: 2024

In this thesis, I discuss the Belarus-Russia client-patron relationship and identify ways in which it has contributed to Aleksandr Lukashenka’s survival in power for the last 30 years. Since the breakup of the Soviet Union, some former republics, such as the Baltics, completed successful transitions, despite difficulties, to full independence, political democracy, and a free market economy. Others, like Belarus, have not transitioned to democracy nor adopted a free market economic system. Belaru