Trochev, Alexei, ‘Pliant Courts, Recalcitrant Chiefs and Judicial Clientelism in Authoritarian Regimes’, in Björn Dressel, Raul Sanchez-Urribarri, and Alexander Stroh-Steckelberg (eds), Informality and Courts: Comparative Perspectives (Edinburgh, 2024; online edn, Edinburgh Scholarship Online, 18 Sept. 2025), https://doi.org/10.3366/edinburgh/9781399535250.003.0005, accessed 6 Oct. 2025.
How and why do some autocracies have pliant courts yet recalcitrant judicial chiefs? Trochev argue that is an unexpected consequence of empowering the judicial chiefs through both growing formal prerogatives and entrenching patron-client relationships inside and outside the judiciary. Judicial chiefs are likely to push for those reforms that enhance their powerful status in clientelist exchanges and resist those that disrupt this status even if these reforms come from neopatrimonial leaders. The chapter draws on an original dataset of biographical, appointment and dismissal data of Kazakhstani chief justices and court presidents, data about judicial budgets, and scandals about judicial informality.