Regulating Digital Social Protection in Post-Soviet States: Comparative Institutional Perspectives from Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan

Abstract

Shared administrative legacies from the Soviet Union are examined in this article and how they shape the development of digital social protection systems when combined with differing institutional arrangements. This paper finds that while there has been research on the digitalisation of welfare services, there has been a shortage of comparative institutional frameworks that explain the differences across post-Soviet countries. Therefore, by applying an institutional analytical framework to the analysis of both the digital social protection systems of Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, this paper aims to fill that gap. This research uses comparative document and policy analyses to evaluate the governance arrangement, legal and regulatory regime, organisational structure and digital infrastructure underpinning the delivery of welfare services in each country. The findings indicate that although both countries have similar administrative legacies, they have both taken different approaches to digital welfare development as a result of their varying levels of coordination capacities and legal formalisation; furthermore, both have pursued different styles of governance. In particular, Azerbaijan has focused on developing centralised service-based platforms whereas Kazakhstan has adopted a more comprehensive approach to developing its digital governance and welfare system. Overall, this article concludes that the way in which institutions have been organised determines the outcome of digital welfare systems.