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It is our pleasure to invite you to the upcoming session of the Interdisciplinary Seminar, hosted by the Robert Zajonc Institute for Social Studies at the University of Warsaw.
This time, our guest will be Michael Derrer from Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts, who will give a presentation titled:
Selective Enforcement and the Governance of Informality: Rethinking “Corruption” in Russia and Ukraine”
We are also pleased to announce that Marco Santoro from University of Bologna will provide commentary on the presentation.
Seminar Details
Date: Thursday, 28 May 2026
Time: 3:30 PM – 5:00 PM
Location: Google Meet
meet.google.com/itf-ojwn-oto
Should you have any questions, please contact Dr Anna Wnuk at anna.wnuk@psych.uw.edu.pl.
Abstract
This presentation proposes a shift from understanding corruption primarily as the violation of formal rules toward analysing how systems function through the differential distribution of exposure, protection, and impunity.
Drawing on long-term empirical engagement in Russia and Ukraine, as well as 55 qualitative interviews conducted in Moscow and Kyiv in 2021, the presentation argues that many so-called anti-corruption reforms modify the visible forms of informal practices without transforming the underlying configurations through which access, protection, and selective rule enforcement are organised.
The presentation develops the concept of selective enforcement as a central mechanism of informal governance. Rather than treating corruption mainly as a collection of illegal acts, it analyses how the capacity to activate, suspend, or negotiate rules becomes unevenly distributed across actors and networks. In this perspective, impunity functions as a form of capital that can be accumulated, transmitted, and converted into economic or political advantage.
The comparative dimension between Russia and Ukraine is used not to establish different “levels of corruption”, but to analyse distinct configurations of informal governance: more centralised and vertically integrated in Russia, and more fragmented and competitive in Ukraine.
The presentation also discusses the implications of this perspective for contemporary reform policies and for the reconstruction of Ukraine, where formally correct institutional reforms may be strategically absorbed by existing configurations of protection and rent distribution.