How Autocrats in Eurasia Manage Elites in War and Crisis

The Fletcher Russia and Eurasia Program recently hosted a talk titled “How Autocrats in Eurasia Manage Elites in War and Crisis,” featuring Mikhail Troitskiy as the speaker. Troitskiy, a Visiting Professor at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and Administrator of the Russia and Eurasia Program, drew on his latest research to examine how authoritarian leaders in the post-Soviet region maintain their ruling coalitions and prevent elite defections during wars and domestic unrest. The presentation – delivered at a lunchtime seminar on November 6, 2025, at The Fletcher School – explored themes from Troitskiy’s three recent articles: “Resilient Autocrats” (Negotiation Journal, 2025), “Managing Multiple Audiences” (Post-Soviet Affairs, 2025), and “Offsetting Audience Costs” (Problems of Post-Communism, 2025). Together, these works analyze the delicate balancing acts Eurasian autocrats perform to survive crises, from pre-war signaling tricks to behind-the-scenes bargaining with insiders.

Elite Defection Risk and Coalition Maintenance

Troitskiy opened by noting that even the most entrenched strongmen cannot govern through fear and fiat alone – “even autocrats rarely rule alone; they either accommodate some interests or resort to brute force to maintain power”. In his view, the risk of elite defection – key insiders breaking ranks or withdrawing support – looms large during war or upheaval. Autocratic survival, therefore, depends on coalition maintenance: keeping generals, oligarchs, security chiefs, and other elites invested in the regime’s fate. Troitskiy emphasized that this often requires a degree of intra-regime negotiation – a give-and-take within the ruling circle to secure loyalty. Far from acting as omnipotent puppeteers, leaders like Vladimir Putin must consult, bargain, and occasionally concede to their lieutenants behind closed doors. This internal bargaining, Troitskiy argued, is aimed at limiting the chances that disgruntled elites might defect or mount opposition when the regime comes under stress. In short, war and crisis force dictators to become deft managers of their own inner circle, not just iron-fisted tyrants.

Dual-Track Signaling Before Russia’s Invasion

One of the centerpiece concepts in Troitskiy’s talk was “dual-track signaling,” drawn from his Post-Soviet Affairs study “Managing Multiple Audiences.” He used this idea to explain a perplexing question: Why did Russia’s well-connected elites remain so passive and unprepared for the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022? According to Troitskiy, the Kremlin pursued a deliberate two-pronged messaging strategy in the lead-up to the war. Publicly, Putin’s government issued hawkish, hardline statements and mobilized nationalist fervor to drum up mass support for a potential conflict. Privately, however, it sent reassuring signals to Russia’s technocrats, oligarchs, and other “globalized” elites that no drastic break with the status quo was imminent. Troitskiy described how throughout 2020-2021, as official rhetoric grew belligerent, insiders were calmed with promises of “business as usual”. This dual-track approach “systematically depressed elites’ perceived probability of war and neutralized potential opposition” by creating a false sense of security among those with the most to lose. In effect, many Russian economic and regional power-brokers came to discount Putin’s threats as mere bluster, convinced that a rational Kremlin would never truly sever ties with the West by invading Ukraine. By the time they realized the war drums were real – as Russian troops poured across the border – it was too late for them to coordinate any resistance or exit strategies. Troitskiy’s analysis of this dual-track signaling helps explain how the Kremlin “misdirected” its own elite class into complacency, thereby avoiding the kind of elite backlash that might have derailed the war plans.

Comparative Cases: Belarus and Kazakhstan

Drawing on his Negotiation Journal article “Resilient Autocrats,” Troitskiy put Russia’s crisis decision-making in a broader Eurasian context by comparing it with the recent experiences of Belarus and Kazakhstan. He noted that autocrats across these cases faced mass unrest or security emergencies in the early 2020s – and each adopted a different mix of tactics to manage their elites and stay in power. In Belarus, President Lukashenko confronted unprecedented protests after the contested 2020 election. Troitskiy recounted that Lukashenko eschewed any power-sharing or dialogue with opponents or disaffected elites, instead relying almost exclusively on brute force and the backing of Moscow to survive. The result was effective in the short term but came at a heavy price: by 2022, Belarus had been reduced to a “quasi-satellite” of Russia, its economy propped up by Kremlin subsidies and its military and foreign policy subservient to Moscow’s wishes. Lukashenko’s regime, Troitskiy observed, “forsook any reconciliation with his own people” and purged even mild dissent within the elite, trading away Belarus’s remaining sovereignty for continued personal rule. This stands in contrast to Kazakhstan, where President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev faced a violent domestic crisis in January 2022. Tokayev initially called in force – even inviting Russian-led troops to help restore order – demonstrating a willingness to crack down hard. Yet as soon as the immediate threat passed, Tokayev pivoted to a more conciliatory track: he “reverted to co-optation through promised reforms to stabilize the situation”. Troitskiy highlighted that Tokayev’s post-crisis outreach (pledging political and economic changes) was essentially an internal negotiation to placate rival elites and the public after the shock of repression. Unlike Lukashenko, who doubled down on fear alone, Tokayev mixed coercion with concession – a strategy that preserved Kazakhstan’s sovereignty and calmed elite tensions following the unrest.

Intra-Regime Bargaining in Wartime

Returning to the case of Russia, Troitskiy discussed how intra-regime bargaining has played out during the ongoing war in Ukraine, drawing from his Problems of Post-Communism article “Offsetting Audience Costs.” He argued that even Vladimir Putin, often perceived as a nearly unchallengeable autocrat, has had to manage his coalition carefully as the war’s costs mount. On the eve of the February 2022 invasion and in its aftermath, the Kremlin took steps to “implicate top elites” in the decision-making and execution of the war. This included convening high-profile meetings with oligarchs and security officials, securing public endorsements of the war from political figures, and quietly distributing economic privileges to loyalists. Such measures, Troitskiy explained, serve a dual purpose: they stifle potential dissent by making key players complicit in the war effort, and they share accountability for risky decisions so that no single individual (especially Putin himself) bears sole blame if things go wrong. By offering side deals and institutional perks in exchange for loyalty, the Kremlin effectively bargained with its insiders to “offset the audience costs” of a faltering campaign. (Audience costs refer to the political price a leader pays if a grand venture like a war fails; in an authoritarian context, this often translates into heightened coup risk or elite backlash.) Troitskiy pointed out that by mid-2023, as Russia’s military goals proved elusive, Putin was carefully adjusting his strategy and rhetoric to keep his coalition intact – for instance, elevating certain hardliners and scapegoating others – rather than behaving as a lone wolf commander. All of this underscores Troitskiy’s broader contention that authoritarian regimes under stress survive not simply through repression, but through ongoing negotiation and power-sharing within the regime’s upper echelons.

Balancing Repression and Concessions for Survival

The discussion concluded on a reflective note about the delicate equilibrium autocrats must maintain in turbulent times. Troitskiy’s comparative analysis reinforced that regimes are most resilient when they balance firmness with flexibility. In his words, leaders who “managed to navigate crises” did so by blending coercion with negotiation, whereas those who relied solely on repression survived “but at tremendous long-term cost to state sovereignty and system robustness”. Across the Eurasian cases, when faced with major shocks like a war or mass uprising, even strongmen inclined to deal-making (like Putin in his pre-2022 style or Tokayev in normal times) will resort to brute force if they feel existentially threatened – yet they often seek to reintroduce bargaining once the immediate crisis ebbs. Conversely, rulers who shut down all elite input (as Lukashenko did) may cling to power, but only by becoming dependent on external patrons and hollowing out their state’s autonomy. The key takeaway from Troitskiy’s talk was that authoritarian durability in war and crisis is not a mystery of personal toughness; it is the result of savvy political management. Autocrats survive by managing elites through a mix of fear and favor – purging some, persuading others – and by sending carefully calibrated signals to multiple audiences. Understanding these maneuvers, Troitskiy suggested, helps explain why some regimes in Eurasia weather the storm of conflict and upheaval, while others crack under the pressure or become beholden to outside support.