Russia’s Descent into Authoritarianism: Are the Siloviki to Blame?

Abstract Are the underlying sources of Russia’s descent into full-blown authoritarian rule since 2012 to be found in Vladimir Putin’s professional socialization in the KGB and staffing of the state with former military and security officers—the siloviki —as has been widely claimed? The answer depends on whether siloviki actually possess a distinctly illiberal worldview that sets them apart from other members of the ruling elite. In this article, we update and expand upon previous research by using data from the 2020 Survey of Russian Elites to compare the attitudes of siloviki and civilians toward a wide range of abstract principles related to representative government, civil liberties, and criminal justice, as well as toward concrete manifestations of those principles (such as the desired level of government control of the Internet and the justifiability of various forms of protest). Our findings lend uniform support to interpretations that lay the blame for the Putin regime’s ever-higher levels of repression on the authoritarian mindset of its silovik members.