Political economy · Autocracy · Media · Corruption

Nikita Zakharov

Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Economics
Department of International Economic Policy, University of Freiburg

I am a postdoctoral researcher in empirical political economy, focusing on non-democratic regimes. My research examines the economic and social consequences of corruption, state propaganda and media control, and how crises such as pandemics and terrorism shape public behavior, political polarization and bureaucratic incentives. I identify causal effects with field and survey experiments and quasi-experimental designs.

I received my PhD in Economics from the University of Freiburg (summa cum laude, 2020; Friedrich-August-von-Hayek Prize, 2021), was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and a visiting research fellow at the Bank of Finland Institute for Emerging Economies (BOFIT). I expect to complete my habilitation at Freiburg in 2027.

Published or forthcoming in

• The Economic Journal
• British Journal of Political Science
• European Economic Review
• Journal of Law and Economics
• Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization
• Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization
• Public Choice

Publications

12 peer-reviewed articles

1. 01

   Can Authoritarian Electoral Propaganda Compete with the Opposition? Experimental Evidence from Russia

   with Michael Rochlitz and Koen Schoors

   British Journal of Political Science 56, e45 (2026)Open accessReplication package

   Abstract

   We examine the effectiveness of electoral propaganda in an autocracy, using Russia as a unique setting. Exploiting the unexpected release of a pro-regime propaganda video about Vladimir Putin shortly before the presidential election, we conducted a field experiment by randomly promoting the video to voters via a telephone survey and measuring self-reported voting behaviour after the election. Our results show that the pro-regime treatment successfully mobilized offline media consumers to vote for Putin, but failed to persuade online media users, and even backfired among respondents dissatisfied with the regime. Using electoral statistics for all major Russian cities and instrumenting public interest in the propaganda video with rainfall, we find a positive, albeit moderate, causal effect of the video on Putin’s vote share. As an alternative treatment, we used a viral anti-corruption video by opposition leader Alexei Navalny, which consistently undermined regime support among both offline and online media consumers.

2. 02

   Fear, Soft Propaganda, and the Demand for Government Intervention: Quasi-Experimental Evidence from Russia

   with Ekaterina Borisova, Timothy Frye, Koen Schoors and Vladimir Zabolotskiy

   European Economic Review 186, 105324 (2026)Open access

   Abstract

   We investigate the effect of fear on public demand for state intervention. Our identification strategy leverages a unique quasi-experiment in Russia, where an episode of a popular health-related TV show aired misinformation on virus-fatality risks during our survey on pandemic behavior. Isolating the exogenous variation in fear of infection with a shift-share instrument based on the unanticipated timing of this episode and pre-Covid spatial variation in the show’s popularity, we find that fear substantially increases demand for regulation, governmental healthcare spending, and unemployment support while leaving policies unrelated to Covid-19, like censorship or housing, unaffected. Mechanism analysis reveals that fear enhances perceptions of others’ noncompliance, consistent with theories of regulation that highlight free-riding concerns.

3. 03

   Polarize and Rule: Independent Media in Autocracy and the Role of Social Media

   with Ruben Enikolopov, Michael Rochlitz and Koen Schoors

   The Economic Journal, forthcoming (advance access 2026)Replication package

   Abstract

   How do independent media affect support for the regime in an autocracy? We carried out two complementary field experiments in Russia at the city and individual levels, randomising access to the country’s only independent TV channel before the 2016 parliamentary elections. In both experiments, we find that independent media foster polarisation. They increase turnout and pro-government votes among regime supporters. However, this effect applies only to voters who rely on news from social media. Among consumers of traditional media, the independent channel uniformly decreases regime support. Our results highlight how social media can condition the effect of traditional media.

4. 04

   Under the Wing: The Effect of Parental Proximity on Intimate Partner Violence and Underreporting

   with Mukhlisa Egamberdieva

   Economics Letters 268, 113125 (2026)

   Abstract

   Does proximity to the natal family protect women against intimate partner violence (IPV)? Leveraging Uzbekistan as a natural laboratory and an original list experiment among 835 married women, we find that women near their parents show a list-experiment prevalence estimate of 9.4% and no detectable reporting gap, whereas those far from their parents report only 8.5% in direct surveys, against a list-experiment estimate of 36.2%. Standard surveys do not merely undercount these victims — they invert the ranking of risk, making the most vulnerable women appear the safest. A parallel attitude experiment supports neither preference falsification nor cultural selection.

5. 05

   Do Terrorist Attacks Polarize Politicians? Evidence from the European Parliamentary Speeches on Migration

   with Hana Jomni

   Journal of Peace Research 63(1), 86–97 (2026)Replication package

   Abstract

   We study the effect of terrorist attacks on the European Parliament (EP) migration discourse. First, using an LLM model, we develop an original dataset on the sentiments of all parliamentary speeches concerning migration for 2009–2019, building on a novel dataset by Sylvester et al. (2023). Second, following Brodeur (2018), we employ a causal identification strategy using quasi-natural randomization in the success or failure of terrorist attacks. We find that a successful terrorist attack has heterogeneous effects on migration sentiments conditional on the political position of the speaker: left-wing speeches become substantially more favorable toward migration after successful attacks, while speeches by right-wing politicians become moderately more negative. Politicians of different ideologies adjusting migration-related sentiment in a direction aligned with their pre-existing partisan positions indicate an increasing polarization among policymakers as a direct consequence of terrorism.

6. 06

   Elections and (Mis)reporting of COVID-19 Mortality: A Quasi-Natural Experiment

   with Parrendah A. Kpeli and Günther G. Schulze

   Economics of Governance 27, article 16 (2026)

   Abstract

   We investigate the effect of direct presidential elections on underreporting COVID-19 mortality, measured as the difference between excess mortality and official statistics. Our identification strategy leverages a natural experiment of the unanticipated onset of the Coronavirus pandemic in 2020 and the asymmetric electoral schedule of presidential elections around the world, in which some countries faced the pandemic with upcoming elections in the next 2 years, while others did not have this electoral pressure. Contrary to conventional wisdom that governments manipulate COVID figures downward to avoid being seen as weak in the politically sensitive times, we find that governments facing elections in the following years report COVID fatalities more truthfully. This effect explains one-fourth of the variation in data manipulation. Further heterogeneous analysis shows that the effect is primarily driven by high-quality democratic elections. Finally, we provide some suggestive evidence for OECD countries that underreporting is strongly negatively correlated with trust in government, thus imposing political costs before the election, which may serve as an explanation of why democratic governments seek to avoid data manipulation during election times.

7. 07

   Too Hot to Play It Cool? Temperature and Negative Media Bias

   with David Stadelmann and Tobias Thomas

   Public Choice 206, 593–608 (2026)

   Abstract

   This paper examines the impact of outdoor temperature on media bias in a quasi-experimental setting. We take advantage of the geographical proximity of the locations of the three major US news networks, ABC News, CBS News, and NBC News, all headquartered in New York City, and granular variations in local daily temperatures. We use more than 10 years of daily hand-coded data on the tonality of evening weekday news broadcasts by each news network to estimate the effect of hot weather on negative media bias in reporting the news affiliated with the Republican and Democratic parties, controlling for time and network-month fixed effects. In line with theoretical expectations regarding human behavior, our results suggest an increase in negative media bias: a 0.5 °C (0.9 °F) increment in daily maximum temperature on a hot day (> 25 °C or > 77 °F) leads to about a 10% increase in the negative bias measured as the difference in the share of negative news about the Republicans and the Democrats. This effect is mainly driven by an increase of the share of negative news about the Republicans. This bias in political reporting exists only for maximum temperatures, as opposed to minimum or average temperatures. The results are robust to an array of placebo tests using past or future temperatures. Examining a similar effect for positive coverage bias, we detect precisely null effects, suggesting that high temperatures are associated only with biased negativity in reporting.

8. 08

   Encouraged to Cheat? Federal Incentives and Career Concerns at the Sub-National Level as Determinants of Under-Reporting of COVID-19 Mortality in Russia

   with Dmitrii Kofanov, Vladimir Kozlov and Alexander Libman

   British Journal of Political Science 53(3), 835–860 (2023)Open accessReplication package

   Abstract

   This article investigates the determinants and consequences of manipulating COVID-19 statistics in an authoritarian federation using the Russian case. It abandons the interpretation of the authoritarian regime as a unitary actor and acknowledges the need to account for a complex interaction of various bureaucratic and political players to understand the spread and the logic of manipulation. Our estimation strategy takes advantage of a natural experiment where the onset of the pandemic adjourned the national referendum enabling new presidential terms for Putin. To implement the rescheduled referendum, Putin needed subnational elites to manufacture favourable COVID-19 statistics to convince the public that the pandemic was under control. While virtually all regions engaged in data manipulation, there was a substantial variation in the degree of misreporting. A third of this variation can be explained by an asynchronous schedule of regional governors’ elections, winning which depends almost exclusively on support from the federal authorities.

9. 09

   Who Profits from Windfalls in Oil Tax Revenue? Inequality, Protests, and the Role of Corruption

   with Michael Alexeev

   Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 197, 472–492 (2022)Coverage: NYU Jordan Center

   Abstract

   We investigate the relationship between oil windfalls and income inequality using the subnational data of one of the resource-richest and highly unequal countries in the world – Russia. While previous literature produced contradictory findings due to the use of an aggregate measure of oil rents mainly in cross-national settings, we focus exclusively on oil rents that accrue to the subnational governments across one country. Our estimation strategy takes advantage of the two specific features of Russian oil taxation: 1) the policy change when sharing oil extraction taxes with local budgets was discontinued; and 2) the oil tax formula being tied directly to the international oil prices making oil price shocks an exogenous measure of change in oil rents. When we look at the period with oil tax revenues shared with the regional governments, we find that oil windfalls had increased income inequality and benefited the wealthiest quintile of the population in regions with more intense rent-seeking. Further, positive oil price shocks combined with greater rent-seeking reduced the share of labor income but increased the income share from unidentified sources traditionally associated with corruption. These effects of oil windfalls disappeared after the Russian government discontinued oil tax revenue sharing with regional governments. Finally, we examine some political implications of rising inequality due to the appropriation of oil windfalls. We find a positive effect of rising inequality on the frequency of protests associated with grievances among the poor and disadvantaged social groups; this effect, however, exists only in relatively democratic regions.

10. 10

    Asymmetric Oil Price Shocks, Tax Revenues, and the Resource Curse

    Single-authored

    Economics Letters 186, 108515 (2020)

    Abstract

    The paper proposes an asymmetric relationship between oil rents and institutions such that only positive oil windfalls adversely affect institutional quality, and negative oil windfalls have no impact. We test this theory empirically by studying the dynamics of institutional quality in Russian regions. We find that increases in tax revenues caused by exogenous positive oil price shocks do not change regional income but increase corruption and reduce regional democracy and governance quality; declines in tax revenues from negative oil price shocks do not affect institutional quality but decrease regional income.

11. 11

    Does Corruption Hinder Investment? Evidence from Russian Regions

    Single-authored

    European Journal of Political Economy 56, 39–61 (2019)

    Abstract

    This paper investigates the relationship between corruption and fixed capital investment in the setting of a corrupt country. Using different measures of corruption – registered cases of bribe taking and incidents of experienced corruption by the population – we find a negative relationship between investment and corruption. We then address the problem of endogeneity of corruption using an instrumental variables approach: when corruption is instrumented with freedom of the press and violations of journalists’ rights, we find an even bigger negative effect. Disaggregating investment by ownership-type shows that only private investment is affected by corruption, but not investment made by state-owned companies. The negative effect is larger for companies with full or partial foreign ownership. Additionally, we look at the relationship between corruption and foreign direct investment (FDI): similar to the investment in fixed capital, we find a negative relationship; however, its statistical significance varies across specifications with different data sources for FDI and different corruption measures.

12. 12

    Corruption in Russia

    with Günther G. Schulze and Bambang Suharnoko Sjahrir

    Journal of Law and Economics 59(1), 135–171 (2016)

    Abstract

    We analyze the determinants of corruption in Russia using law enforcement data on corruption incidents for a panel of 79 Russian regions for the period 2004–13. We find that the relative salaries of bureaucrats determine corruption levels: corruption declines as relative salaries rise, yet at strongly diminishing rates. Furthermore, we show that even very limited media freedom helps to curtail corruption. Other important determinants are the strength of law enforcement, education levels, and unemployment rates.

Accepted and under revision

• Can’t Buy Me Love? Cash Transfers and Support for an Autocrat

  with Diana Zarbailova

  AcceptedJournal of Law, Economics, and Organization

• Political Cycles of Media Repression

  with Günther G. Schulze

  Reject & resubmitReview of Economics and Statistics

Working papers

• Transit Migration and Crime: Evidence from Colombia

  with Ramon Rey and Günther G. Schulze · Under review

• Roots of Courage: The Memory of Repression and Dissent under Autocracy

  with Andrey Tkachenko and Amir Saimassay

• From Despair to War: The Long Shadow of the USSR Collapse and Enlistment in Russia’s Proxy War in Donbas

  Single-authored

• The Effect of COVID-19 Cash Transfers on Health and Well-being of Adolescents: Quasi-Experimental Evidence from Russia

  with Vladimir Kozlov and Dmitrii Kofanov

• State-Induced Preference Falsification: Evidence from a Natural Experiment in Russia

  Single-authored

• Ain’t No Silver Bullet? Gun Laws and Suicide in the US

  with Joshua Ball and Günther G. Schulze

• Between Modernity and Tradition: A List Experiment on Marital Choice and Coercion in Uzbekistan

  with Mukhlisa Egamberdieva

Work in progress

• We Do Not Abandon Our Own: Individual Sanctions and the Careers of Russian Officials

  with David Szakonyi

• Activating Preference Falsification: An Experimental Test of the Fear Mechanism

  with Andrey Tkachenko

Other writing and data

• Corruption in Russia

  with Günther G. Schulze · In Handbook on the Geographies of Corruption, ed. Barney Warf, Edward Elgar, 195–212 (2018)

• The Art of Data Manipulation in Russia: Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic

  Russian Analytical Digest 314 (2024)

• Corruption in Russia: Bribe-Taking in Russian Regions, 2004–2012

  DatasetVersion 1.0 (2020)

Teaching

University of Freiburg

• Introduction to Empirical Economics Using Stata

  Every winter term since 2022/23; also 2019 and 2021

• Economics of Corruption

  Every summer term since 2022; also winter 2020/21

• The Determinants of Violent Behavior

  Block course with Günther G. Schulze, winter 2021/22

• Der Krieg in der Ukraine und seine Folgen

  Public lecture series (Ringvorlesung), summer 2022

• Seminars

  The Economics of Corruption; The Political Economics of Information and Media; Governments Breaking Bad; Political Economy of Urbanization and Development (2014–2019)

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