shefstvon.

1937 S. N. Harper Govt. Soviet Union viii. 134 The institution of so-called ‘patronage’ (chefstvo) is extended also to the Red Army and aims to keep those in military service in the everyday life of the community.

1948 J. Towster Polit. Power in U.S.S.R. xiii. 322 Another form of tutelage was the so-called shefstvo or patronage by industrial regions over agricultural regions.

1950 B. Moore Soviet Politics viii. 173 Another method, which evidently sprang up in the early thirties and then was permitted to die a natural death, was called ‘patronage’ (shefstvo), usually the patronage of a specific factory or of a specific group of workers over some section of the administration.

1955 H. Hodgkinson Doubletalk 120 Shefstvo, patronage exercised by a shef or ‘chief’ is the Soviet equivalent of ‘empire building’ in Western business and service jargon.