Russia has most of the usual features of rentier states: autocracy, weak political and judicial institutions, arbitrary governance, lack of the rule of law, little transparency, restraints on freedom of expression, widespread corruption, cronyism, and nepotism. Also common to rentier states are short investment horizons, vulnerability to commodity-price volatility – euphoria when they surge, crisis when they collapse – and an underdeveloped and uncompetitive manufacturing sector.
但是从本质上来说，俄罗斯仍然是一个“食利国”，即主要收入是租金——对俄罗斯而言，就是石油和天然气——而不是税收的国家，这样使人们对政治代表性没有什么需求。相反，国家成为了政治企业家的目标，他们努力控制国家从而获取国家所控制的租金。