Risk management and Russian society

Simo MannilaNational Institute for Health and Welfare

Aleksanteri Institute University of Helsinki, 28 Oct 2014

Structure of the presentation

•Risk: various theoretical frames of reference •Russian risk society•Informal security regime and some empirical ideas

The concept of ”risk society”• Starting point: Ulrich Beck’s concept of risk society in the

1980s – based on ecological considerations• But where is the risk society? At which level the risks

exist? Are they identified or constructed – if yes, by whom? Whose risks are we talking about? Competing discourses on e.g. economic growth

• Beck: discourses of governance – rather far from socio-political analysis, mainly new theoretical and critical inputs

• General interest of social sciences in the concept of risk since the 1980s - Beck is only one example?

The concept of ”insurance society”

• ”Insurance society” concept by Francois Ewald 1984 – directly relevant for social policy-making

• Link with corporatist regime? Insurance as a form of risk pooling: for those with a ”social package” i.e. employer-related social schemes?

• Development depends on the future of social dialogue? Is there a competition of social policy regimes: potential convergence towards neoliberal models?

Social policy as risk management / the World Bank

• Robert Holzmann & al. (2000; 2001): mitigation of or fight against (i.e. prevention of) risks: there are various ways of prevention and mitigation incl. social policy

• Classification of risks by sources (e.g. life cycle, social, economic, environmental) and levels of occurence (micro/ idiosyncratic, meso, macro/ covariate)

• The types of risk include e.g. floods/ drought, pollution, political turmoil, financial crises, trade shocks, unemployment, old age, birth and disability

Risk management strategies / WB

(1) Prevention: reduction of the probability of a down-side risk (e.g. lifelong learning, innovation, social dialogue, development of buffering social protection)

(2) Decreasing the potential impact of a down-side risk (three mitigation strategies: portfolio diversification i.e investment in various forms of ”capital” , risk pooling formal i.e. social insurance and informal, and hedging i.e. someone assuming the risk and is compensated)

(3) Coping with the risk that has occurred: e.g. income loss coped with dissaving, migration, increased work, reduced consumption, various (also social) transfers

The concept of risk in anthropology

• Mary Douglas’ work ”Risk and Blame” (1992), ”Risk and Culture (& Aron Wildavsky 1982) on perception of risk – also the early ”Purity and Danger” (1966) - linking these two

• Starting point to a more general ” a cultural theory of risk”• Harms associated with transgression of norms > perception of

deviant behaviour and contact with the ”other/s” as risks• Group & grid –theoretical framework: there are ”high group”

and ”low group” and ”high grid” and ”low grid” ways of life > four alternatives of risk management and life styles

• These alternatives differ also in the definition of deviance and ”the other/s”, how the contact is regulated and carried out > definitions of eligibility, inclusion vs. exclusion, relationship to e.g. immigrants and ethnic minorities

Still some approaches to risk…

• Rational choice theory in taking risks < criticised by the cultural theory pointing out that people are not so rational

• ”Psychometric” approach pointing out the heuristics and biases of the perception/ definition of risks – to be studied empirically

• Attempts to link the ”psychometric” approach to cultural theory?

• Deborah Lupton’s work (Risk, 1999), (Risk and Everyday Life with J Tulloch 2003)

• Extensive international discourse, received also in Finland in the late 1980s and early 1990s (e.g. Eräsaari 1989, 1995)

Some key criticism of the concept of risk and a response

• Focus on risk in social policy means gearing it away from needs?

• Does it also mean less focus on human rights or social rights?

• World Bank Hate Club and its response?• Is the work on the concept of risk compliant with an

emphasis on human rights?• Would the concept of risk, however, be a more feasible

concept for analyzing social policies and their implementation in a globalized world and under scarcity of resources?

Risk and Russian society• Russian society is a risk society to be defined in empirical terms:

risk of wars, some crime (incl. terror attacks), economic shocks (regional, branch-specific, general), stochastic law enforcement (e.g. occupational safety) increased morbidity and mortality at individual and family level

• Is this reflected in the concept of social policy-making? Is there a risk management aspect in the design of social policy? No? Whose risks are ”managed” by policy-making at various levels

• What risks are perceived and who defines the risks? Does the elite have different risks from those of some parts of the population?

Perception of risks > informal security regime• Different perception and management of risks by different

parts of the society – is this true?• The concept of informal security regime: risk management

schemes of those with low trust in the government and its social policies > reliance on traditional family and other informal networks

• Develops due to less coping mechanisms among poor people for various types of schocks

• Less influence on formal and informal institutions, limited voice > dependent security, clientelization (”putinism”?)

• Reduced social capital > short-term orientation in life, no long-term perspectives and general risk avoidance > poverty culture

• Risk-taking is generally good for the economic development

Informal security regime – background

• Concept developed by the UK researchers Ian Gough & Geoff Wood (e.g. 2004)

• Global concept, no specific mention of countries in transition; comparisons with Asian, African and Latin American countries – a concept for ”development contexts” (cf. German Gref’s comment of the development phase of the Russian Federation)

• Question 1: can the concept be applicable on the development of Russian social policy, or risk management schemes in Russia?

• Question 2: can a research programme it implicitly contains be operationalized to fit into the Russian context

Some ideas for empirical research• Are there differences in social capital and its official vs. inofficial

forms by segments of the Russian society?• Trust and networks (also transnational) and how they work

today?• Informal economy and its repercussions – research beyond

economics with no moral undertones, into life style, risk-taking• Is there informal security regime in the Russian society, if yes,

where? • A case: extended families providing work, care and support, e.g.

”babushka in flux” phenomenon – were there any alternatives?• Risk-taking propensity and short- vs. long-term life perspectives in

various population groups: ”no risk, no champagne” • Ethnic minorities and immigrants in the light of Douglas’ ideas?

Legitimation of discrimination?

Why informal security regime?• The state is seen as captured by an ”elite”, ”clan” or

”nomenclatura” (”elite”?) not representing all people – is this true now?

• In some cases, there is a ”colonial” legacy e.g. in the central government policies towards some minorities or minority regions whose voice is not (adequately) heard

• (Risks of) market collapses (e.g. hyperinflation, 1998 devaluation, sanctions?) and political scandals of which both there is ample evidence in Russia reduce the trust in formal economy and formal security regime also durign stability

• Informal economy is wide-spread and maintains a more general informality in society, enhancing also informal security (diversification of the portfolio by the WB concept)

Final comments• Various theoretical frameworks of risk can (and should) be merged • Several middle-range empirical hypotheses to be drawn on the

concept of risk• Global frames of reference available, a possibility to comparative

studies • Combining various disciplinary fields of research on Russian society• Links between formal and informal security regimes: is increased

formality as a characteristic of modernity, as expected earlier? Findings from the developing countries contradict this – hybrid or syncretic forms instead? Are we all moving towards risk societies and partly informal regime?

• But: the perception of risks is now reduced in the Russian Federation, due to the return of the national self-image as a super power – return to the question who defines the risks and how?

Thank you!