ETHNIC QUOTA-BASED GOVERNANCE AND CONSOCIATIVE MODEL IN KABARDINO-BALKARIA, 1922-2022
Throughout Soviet and post-Soviet decades political management and governance in the North Caucasus have been drawing on features of the nationalities policy aimed at ethnic groups integration in consociations. This paper explores the construction of plural societies on the example of Kabardino-Balkaria and through the prism of historical institutionalism and the analysis of limited-access orders. Delving into centenary historical context, the author explores the formation of principles, formal and informal rules, which became proven attitudes for Soviet and ex-nomenklatura political leaders in Kabardino-Balkaria. In the context of institutional approach, ethnic representation appears as an institution that favors reduction of violence in the struggle for power and integrates ruling coalitions in multinational polities. The main focus is on identifying the dynamics of the ethnic quotas configuration at the regional level in the executive and legislative branches, as well as in key positions. In addition to defining ethnic quotas as, to a certain extent, inherited Soviet practices which are reproduced both in fragile and basic social orders, the paper examines cases of deviation from the conventional proportions of ethnic representation in government bodies of Kabardino-Balkaria causing drastic challenges to the unity of divided societies and the stability of political settlements. It is argued that political ethnic quotas are an important tool in preserving social and territorial integration in multiethnic Kabardino-Balkaria over the past hundred years. The long-term reproduction of this institution actualizes the issues of comparing consociative regions of the North Caucasus and different models of ethnic-quota based governance.