Evolution of Power Distance in Russia

China and Russia are both countries with strong state traditions who have favored communist systems over the western idea of democracy. But, in the 1990’s, China and Russia began to stray from their communist systems in their own ways. Russia began the shift with rapid political liberalization under Gorbachev followed by the fall of the Soviet Union. China, on the other hand, embarked on a managed transition with step by step introduction of capitalism while the CCP remained the sole political power. China’s transition was hugely successful, experiencing astounding GDP growth and the largest increase in human welfare in history. Russia’s reforms on the other hand was a failure as the soviet lost half its territory and population. Following the fall of the Soviet Union was an economic recession with an increase in crime and death rates. China experienced a huge increase in human welfare while Russia saw a huge downturn. After comparing China’s and Russia’s different path towards modernization, China has seen stronger and stabled growth as opposed to Russia’s shortcomings.

Unequal power is “the extent to which the less powerful members of institutions and organizations within a country expect and accept that power is distributed” (Hofstede, 1997, p. 28).

Firstly, power distance is defined as the extent to which the less powerful members of organisations within a country expect and accept that power is distributed unequally. Hofstede notes that, "all societies are unequal, but some are more unequal than others." It has two types of power distance which is high power distance and low power distance. The high power distance society is paternalistic ways of

In today 's era, if there are politics, there is power. It is no surprise, that is fundamental to politics the concept of power. Power, has a constitutive force that defines the discipline of international relations. Power’s meaning has broadened, and it is now an ‘essentially concept’. The developments in conceptual thinking of power have progressively demanded acceptance of new logical focuses, research, methods, as to what counts as international relations. Thus, arguments over the concept of power has helped broaden the discipline of having power. If we have a broad discipline the benefits could affect international relations making our Nations stronger or more effects. Power can be found throughout relationships between individuals and things.

In the year of 1991, the socialist giant –Soviet Union collapsed. At the beginning, many people expected a fast tend of democratization to spread all around not only Russia but also even the whole Eurasian areas. However, this expectation did not come into reality. Or in other words, Russia was anticipated to accept a total new political order internally and externally. But transitions are never so easy. Sometimes, they can be extremely difficult and painful. From my point of view, even until today, Russia is still suffering from the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet Union, which has been profoundly influencing Russia’s domestic and foreign policy.

Conflict handling is best addressed when both parties engage in an integrative approach where they work in cooperation and generate solutions that address the needs of both parties (de Reuver, 2006). This isn’t always the approach, however. Power can prevent a positive problem solving approach. The one holding the power simply does not need to operate in this way. “The powerful are less dependent on others than others are on them for acquiring and maintaining important resources” (de Reuver, 2006). In short, conflict, difficult already to manage, becomes much more difficult to handle if the power is unequal.

Over the past two decades, Russia has experienced a transition from democracy to competitive authoritarianism. Many scholars have conjectured the reason for this transition, but the most compelling reason for the rise of competitive authoritarianism in Russia is the concept of performance legitimacy. Russian political trends since the fall of the Soviet Union have been heavily linked to their economic success; the public opinion about the performance of the political systems contributed greatly to the dissolution of democracy, and is currently contributing greatly to the maintenance of the authoritarian system of government. Additionally, in contrasting recent Russian political and economic trends with those in France, a country with a similar

The United States is an example of a low power distance culture. The United States is a democracy run by an executive branch, legislative branch, and judicial branch. Members of this culture are aware that some other individuals may have more power, influence, and authority but those lower-ranking members are not intimidated or more respectful toward members in higher standings of power (Sprague, Stuart, Bodary, Verderber, Sellnow, 2015). An example of this would be that although the United States is run by the President, he or she is always under examination of the other branches of government as well as the citizens they represent (Carroll,

Russia has now moved toward a centralized semi-authoritarian state in which the leadership seeks to legitimize its rule through managed elections, populist appeals, foreign policy focused on enhancing the country’s geopolitical influence, and continued economic growth (CIA, 2015).

Those observers who valued cultural preconditions would have expected a new Asia to be underwritten from Asian values or a theocracy from Islamic values or Leninist legacy to perpetuate something like the Soviet regime. The theorists who did see the modernisation of the economy were also doubtful when it came to the popular government in the region (Vladislav, 2009). The Soviet Central Asia 's most important economic indicators saw it as notably higher than Africa and South Asia and still came out nearing the bottom of the post-communist world with much of rural economies and less of a middle class (Robert, 2009). The high level of literacy in Central Asia although suggested that democratic beliefs and civil society could emerge. This seemed unlikely to outweigh other legacies, but the preconditions thinking of every stripe anticipated uniformity of regimes and at the same time a uniformly nondemocratic regime all across the post-Soviet Central Asia.

Power distance is the way cultures create levels due to power, authority, prestige, status, wealth, and material assets.

Comparisons will be made with individualism, long-term orientation, and power distance. Individual societies take care of the immediate family and themselves. On the other hand, other societies come collectively that are in groups. These findings will explain how different these two countries are. The first comparison will be individualism with the United States at 91% and Ghana at 15%. The next comparison will be long-term orientation. In the United States, we look five months to a year ahead. We do this because we know we have enough resources to last us that long. In other countries, they may not have resources to last them that long. With these statistics, the United States is at 26% and Ghana at 4%. Power distance will be the next comparison with these two countries. Power distance is the knowledge that members of institutions and organizations spread power unequally. Power distance represents the acceptance of this fact. Ghana holds the higher percentage at 80% and the United States at 40%. In Ghana, everything has its place and needs no further

We have to contend, in the exercise of our personal power, with the influences of such power-channels in our environments and how they add to, limit or distort our exercise of power - e.g. hierarchies, coalitions,

Power/Distance (PD), “refers to the degree of inequality that exists- and is accepted- among people with and without power. A high PD score indicates that society accepts an unequal distribution of power, and that people understand “their place” in the system. Low PD means that power is shared and well dispersed.” (www.mindtools.com) As an example from the article, Myers goes on to say, “there were basically four levels: VP, director, manager, and worker bee. You only talked to people at your level.” SK Telecom boasted that

When the hierarchy in a country is really strict, there will be a lot of power distance between the top and bottom of the hierarchy. This will be accepted but is also expected, as every part of the hierarchy reports to the part above it, so it makes sense to them to do so and this will eventually result in a very big power distance between the very top and the very bottom of the hierarchy. This is shown in the PDI of China, it is very high, around 78. This is because of the social emphasis on the importance of family, families in China are build around a certain hierarchy, the oldest members are the most important and have the most power, and this has been taken over by companies as well. A country that shows the opposite of this are the United States, they emphasize equality and try to reinforce cooperative interaction across power levels, this resulted in a low score of 40.