In “A normal country,” co-authored with the Harvard economist Andrei Shleifer, Treisman contended that by the early 2000s Russia had evolved from a collapsing communist state into a “normal, middle-income capitalist economy” which held “generally free—if flawed—elections.”[6] While distinctive in its large nuclear arsenal and “pivotal role in international affairs,” Russia mostly resembled other middle-income countries such as Mexico or Malaysia, which confronted a similar set of problems—widespread corruption, politicized judges, a constrained media, income inequality, and economic crises.

[7] One response pointed to Russians’ low and declining life expectancy,[8] while another suggested that the appropriate comparison group was not all middle-income countries but just the relatively successful post-communist states of Central Europe (the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, and Poland).

[11] In the Introduction, Treisman argued that Putin’s increasingly authoritarian approach since 2012 aimed to freeze or even reverse the rapid economic and social modernization of the previous decade, which—while boosting living standards—had also sparked protests against the regime.

The Crimean episode suggested “an apparently growing affinity for Pyrrhic victories.”[13] Treisman has characterized the early Putin as a classic “informational autocrat” or “spin dictator” (see below).

In an article in 2007, Treisman coined the term “silovarch” to refer to an emerging set of Russian business magnates with backgrounds in the security services and personal ties to Putin.

In a widely cited article, he found that higher economic development, British colonial heritage, Protestantism, and a long history of democracy correlated with cleaner government, while federal structure was associated with more corruption.

He used formal models and empirical analysis to reexamine a number of common claims—investigating, for instance, whether political decentralization encourages local governments to improve performance in order to attract mobile capital,[19] stimulates greater policy experimentation,[20] weakens the central state,[21] or increases inflation.

[23] In The Architecture of Government (Cambridge University Press, 2007),[24] Treisman addressed a series of classic arguments about decentralization, modeling their logic, and concluded that almost none were likely to hold in general.

[26] He has proposed a “conditional modernization theory,” in which economic development creates a potential for stable democracy, but the exact timing of transitions depends on contingent events and decisions of leaders.

Common errors, according to Treisman, included underestimating the strength of opposition and failing to react, overestimating the leader’s own popularity and calling elections only to lose them, starting unsuccessful wars, and sliding down the “slippery slope” of self-weakening concessions.

[32] Fewer dictators were using overt violent repression to intimidate the public and more were, instead, faking democracy and manipulating media to persuade citizens that they were effective and benevolent leaders.