Oversight of the Legal System in an Authoritarian Regime: Police and Court Monitoring in Russia

Abstract How can citizens in authoritarian regimes exercise oversight of the legal system? I examine police and court monitoring, bottom-up oversight activities popular in pre-war Russia (2012–2022). Monitoring pushes the state to honor commitments it has made in its own laws, taking advantage of the authoritarian state’s need for information and legitimacy. Yet monitoring activities are not just about improving the state’s performance. Using interviews, participant observation and document analysis of monitoring campaigns in pre-war Russia, I argue that monitoring can empower citizens in a profoundly disempowering environment, perhaps its most important legacy in a closing authoritarian space.