ELITE POLITICAL NETWORKS, NETWORK CHANGE, AND VIOLENT CONFLICT IN UKRAINE AND GEORGIA by ANDREW MACDONALD AKIN BARBARA A. CHOTINER, COMMITTEE CHAIR KARL DEROUEN TERRY ROYED SIMANTI LAHIRI MARGARET PEACOCK A DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Political Science in the Graduate School of The University of Alabama TUSCALOOSA, ALABAMA 2013 Copyright Andrew MacDonald Akin 2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ABSTRACT The degree of variance in political outcomes after the Soviet collapse remains a subject of political inquiry because of the complicated nature of republic experiences during transition. This dissertation explores the variance in post-Soviet transitional violence, or its absence, in Ukraine and Georgia, by using social network analysis. The argument made is that the degree to which political elites in Georgia and in Ukraine were connected or fragmented is an untested, but highly relevant, factor in conflict onset. While the impact of elites on regime transition and armed conflict is a well-reviewed subject in the comparative literature, no study formally models elite networks as an explanation for why conflict begins, or abates. At the center of the argument is the structure of political elite networks created by personal or professional connections. Using social network analysis methods and eleven original datasets—from material in English, Russian, and Ukrainian—this study demonstrates that Ukrainian elites maintained well-connected and more densely tied networks both before and after the Soviet collapse than did elites in Georgia. Conclusions drawn from this study suggest that well-integrated elites create mechanisms by bargaining, or the creation of high social capital, to avoid conflict. This study contributes both theoretically and substantively to the existing literature. Conflict theorists should incorporate the idea of elite network structures as a contributory factor to conflict or peace during transitions. The datasets used for this work offer an initial foray into formally modeling elites and assessing their network dynamics. ii DEDICATION To Mary Virginia Cowan, with the hope she inherits a more peaceful world. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I made the mistake of thinking a dissertation is “just a long term paper.” Fortunately, a number of people and institutions supported me during this project and deserve far more thanks and appreciation that I can adequately give here. First, I must say thank you to my committee chair, Professor Barbara Chotiner. Her constant assistance, availability, and encouragement made this project possible. Second, members of my dissertation committee gave generously of their time and talent to bring the research to a successful conclusion. I also must thank Dr. Richard Fording, Chair of the Department of Political Science for his support. The Department of Political Science also generously sponsored several travel requests for me during the course of this project. The University of Alabama Graduate School and the Graduate Student Association also provided me with generous research funding. Further, the staff of the Slavic and Eastern European Library at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign were immensely helpful during my stay there in 2009. In addition, the staff of the European Reading Room at the Library of Congress was the most helpful, dedicated, and professional research supporters I ever met. My visit there in 2011 yielded fruitful research for the datasets in this work. I also greatly appreciate Joe Caviglia, Wallace Vaughn, and Will Gassenheimer for their hospitality during my stay in Washington, D.C. I must also express my immense gratitude and love for my family and friends for their indefatigable support. My mother, Sandy Akin was a constant source of encouragement during not only the dissertation phase, but throughout my graduate school career. I must also thank my iv mom and Dr. Jim Kitchens for their proofreading work. Further, my father Ed Akin supported me in every way he could. My sisters, Anne Elizabeth Akin Cowan and Caroline Akin Hubbard, also were always there when I needed them. I also had a great number of friends on whom I could always depend for encouragement and much needed respites from the dissertation. I must especially thank Dr. Greg Austin for his advice and support during the process. v CONTENTS ABSTRACT ................................................................................................ ii DEDICATION ........................................................................................... iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ......................................................................... iv LIST OF TABLES .................................................................................... vii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS ................................................................... viii 1. INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................1 2. REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE ......................................................21 3. RESEARCH DESIGN ...........................................................................58 4. UKRAINE..............................................................................................73 5. GEORGIA...................................................................................…….118 6. COMPARISONS…………….………………………………………151 7. CONCLUSION………………………………………………………165 REFERENCES ........................................................................................174 vi LIST OF TABLES 4.1 Ukrainian Network Analysis..............................................................105 5.1 Georgian Network Analysis ..............................................................140 6.1 Network Density ...............................................................................155 vii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 1.1 Two Mode Network…………………………………………………15 1.2 One Mode Network………………………………………………….16 4.1 Ukrainian Central Committee, with node labels ...............................107 4.2 Ukrainian Politburo, with node labels ...............................................109 4.3 Ukrainian Rada, with node labels ......................................................110 4.4 Ukrainian Supreme Soviet Delegates, with node labels ....................112 4.5 Ukrainian All Soviet data, with node labels ......................................114 4.6 Ukrainian Post-Soviet network, with node labels ..............................116 4.7 Ukrainian Soviet actors in Post-Soviet network, with node labels ....117 5.1 Georgian Central Committee, with node labels .................................142 5.2 Georgian Politburo, with node labels .................................................143 5.3 Georgian Supreme Soviet Delegates, with node labels ....................145 5.4 Georgian, All Soviet, with node labels ..............................................147 5.5 Georgian Post-Soviet, with node labels ............................................149 5.6 Georgian Post-Soviet elites with Soviet ties, with node labels ..........150 6.1 Central Committee Networks ............................................................155 6.2 Politburo Networks ............................................................................156 6.3 Supreme Soviet Delegates Networks .................................................157 6.4 All Soviet Networks ...........................................................................158 6.5 Post-Soviet Networks ........................................................................159 viii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION On March 11, 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev became the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). He inherited a socio-political system floundering under its own weight of economic disparity, bureaucratic inefficiency, and military overreach. His attempts at reform—glasnost and perestroika—would unleash pent up frustration and a wave of opportunistic forces that destroyed the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) in short order. The speed with which the Soviet Union imploded under Gorbachev represents one of the most significant institutional transformations in modern history. The reasons for the collapse, its after-effects, and the restructuring of the former Soviet landscape occupy volumes of scholarly material. Much has been described and some explained, but a persistent question of this experience remains: what caused the varying degree of outcomes with respect to violence? The three Baltic republics made a smooth transition to independence, as the Eastern European states slugged through the transitional process while the Caucasus republics experienced a number of violent episodes and the Central Asian republics remain trapped in an authoritarian institutional framework. Even as this work is prepared in 2013, explaining the puzzling of post-Soviet transitions and the spectrum of violence within them remains a challenging and fascinating field of study. Case selection This dissertation seeks to explain the dynamics of, and variation in, instances of violence or non-violence in two post-Soviet states: Ukraine and Georgia. In doing so, it traces the social 1 networks of political elites in those states, along with those of the political entrepreneurs who sought to achieve elite status in post-Soviet republics as the Soviet Union collapsed. Georgia and Ukraine during the period from 1970-1994 are exemplary cases for assessing political outcomes during post-Soviet