The Disposable Oligarchs
The article examines how wealthy business elites who align closely with authoritarian leaders—such as Russia’s oligarchs under Putin, Turkish tycoons under Erdogan, and Saudi executives under MBS—often face severe consequences when their power is perceived as a threat. It warns that U.S. business leaders, particularly those prominently supporting a second Trump administration, may be entering a similar perilous bargain. While such alliances can yield short-term gains, they risk long-term vulnerability as authoritarian regimes consolidate power by subordinating or eliminating independent economic actors. The piece underscores that in authoritarian state capitalist systems, loyalty trumps autonomy, and no elite is truly secure.
- ▪Prominent U.S. tech billionaires like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Sundar Pichai were seated prominently at Donald Trump’s second inauguration, signaling a close alignment between business elites and political power.
- ▪Russia’s oligarchs rose to power in the 1990s by acquiring state assets cheaply but were later targeted by Vladimir Putin, who imprisoned some and seized their assets to consolidate state control.
- ▪In Turkey, the government has used tax penalties, regulatory pressure, and asset seizures to punish business leaders, such as the Dogan Media Group, for perceived disloyalty to Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
- ▪Saudi Arabia’s 2017 Ritz-Carlton detentions involved the arrest and forced asset transfers of hundreds of elites, including Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, under the guise of an anticorruption campaign led by MBS.
- ▪The article warns that U.S. democratic backsliding, including the use of 'lawfare' to target opponents, may create conditions where American business leaders face similar risks if they align too closely with authoritarian-leaning leaders.
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The Disposable OligarchsWhy Wealthy Elites Come to Regret Their Bargains With Authoritarians Christopher Hartwell and Tricia D. Olsen April 28, 2026 The Red Square in Moscow, Russia, April 2026 Ramil Sitdikov / Reuters CHRISTOPHER A. HARTWELL is Professor of International Business Policy and Head of the International Management Institute at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences School of Management and Law and a Professor at Kozminski University.TRICIA D. OLSEN is Professor of Global Public Policy and Political Science and Harold E. Stassen Chair at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey School of Public Affairs. More by Christopher Hartwell More by Tricia D. Olsen Share & Download Print Subscribe to unlock this feature or Sign in. Save Sign in and save to read later Close Share The Disposable Oligarchs Why Wealthy Elites Come to Regret Their Bargains With Authoritarians Christopher Hartwell and Tricia D. Olsen Share in email Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Copy Link Copied Article link: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/disposable-oligarchshttps://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/disposable-oligarchs Copy Gift Link Copied This is a subscriber-only feature. Subscribe now or Sign in. Create Citation Copied Chicago MLA APSA APA Chicago Cite not available at the moment MLA Cite not available at the moment APSA Cite not available at the moment APA Cite not available at the moment Request Reprint Request reprint permissions here. The attendees at U.S. President Donald Trump’s second inauguration included a typical cast of government officials, legislators, and cabinet nominees. What was not so typical was the crew of billionaires who also attended—and took center stage. The Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, the Google CEO Sundar Pichai, and the Tesla/SpaceX CEO Elon Musk were all seated one row behind Trump’s children and in front of many of his cabinet nominees, including Pete Hegseth, Robert Kennedy, Jr., and Kristi Noem. To many, the billionaires’ prominent placement—and the overtures they seemed to be making in anticipation of Trump’s swearing in—signified a new bargain between U.S. business elites and the president. Such a bargain is not just dangerous for a country’s democracy but also for the business elites who make it. And it brings the United States much closer to other countries in which alliances between government leaders and business tycoons are more typical.With good reason, many observers in the United States saw in Trump’s inauguration the enshrining of a new oligarchy. The term “oligarch” is more commonly associated with post-Soviet Russia. In the late 1980s, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s major economic reforms, known as perestroika, allowed once nationalized and state-run industrial assets to increasingly make their way into the hands of politically connected managers and a nascent entrepreneurial class of business executives. The fall of the Soviet Union accelerated this transition, as economic mismanagement by Kremlin officials led to chronic cash shortages and forced the government to borrow money from private banks. As collateral, private bankers demanded stakes in major state-owned enterprises. When the government invariably defaulted, the banks gained control of the commanding heights of the Russian economy.The owners of these banks—favored insiders such as Roman Abramovich, Boris Berezovsky, and Mikhail Khodorkovsky—used these bargain-basement takeovers…
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