Please join us for an upcoming lecture by Michael Derrer, Professor of Economic Sociology at Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (HSLU):
Title: Corruption as Allocated Protection: Evidence from Russian and Ukrainian Business, with Implications for Post-Soviet Eurasia
In this lecture, Professor Derrer examines corruption in Russia and Ukraine not simply as a failure of governance, but as a system in which protection, enforcement, and access to state institutions are distributed selectively. Drawing on fifty interviews with entrepreneurs, officials, lawyers, anticorruption professionals, and scholars in Moscow and Kyiv, as well as three decades of experience working across the post-communist region, he explores how individuals come to be protected from inspections and prosecution, what that protection costs, and what happens when it disappears.
The lecture also considers the implications for Ukraine's reconstruction, asking whether conventional anticorruption measures can adequately capture forms of influence that operate through decisions not to act. Professor Derrer concludes by considering what the experience of Russia and Ukraine can teach us about selective enforcement, political and economic advantage, and the relationship between protection, wealth, and social standing across post-Soviet Eurasia.
Professor Derrer has worked for three decades in Russia, Ukraine, and Eastern Europe as a consultant, company director, and certified court interpreter. He holds a doctorate from the University of Warsaw. The research presented in this lecture appears in a forthcoming trilogy with Peter Lang Academic Publishers (2026–2027).
We hope you will join us for this timely and thought-provoking discussion.
Further information about Professor Derrer’s research is available at hslu.ch/beyondintegrity.
