| The dissertation presents a theory of civil society from above, to account for variations in civil society development in different regions of post-Soviet Russia. By tracing the different developmental trajectories of regional civic environmental advocacy communities in Nizhny Novgorod, Yaroslavl, and Sverdlovsk oblasts through the early and mid 1990s, the dissertation demonstrates the critical role played by regional elites in the mobilization and promotion of civil society. The theory is political, state centered, and elite oriented, in contrast to more traditional sociological explanations for civil society development. Where Russian regional state elites---in particular the governors, who tend to wield tremendous power---took specific and active measures to mobilize civil society during the key period of the early 1990s, civil society flourished, relatively speaking. Of the three regions in the study, this occurred to the greatest extent in Nizhny Novgorod and to the least extent in Yaroslavl. In a post-communist setting such as Russia, civil society emerges autonomously only weakly unless it is fostered by specific, proactive, and timely measures taken by state elites. |
