Anatoly Kulik
POLITICAL PARTIES IN THE POST-SOVIET SPACE: A UNIQUE RESPONSE TO CONTEXT OR A FUTURE OF THE WESTERN MODEL?”1Institute of Scientific Information on Social Sciences,
Russian Academy of Sciences.
Moscow, Russia.
Prepared for presentation at the XVIIIth World Congress of the International Political Science Association, 1-5 August 2000, Quebec
After collapse of the communist rule and decay of
the Soviet Union, its former constituent republics became the NIS or newly independent
states. These fifteen post-Soviet states jointed the most recent and the vastest
“third wave” of democratization that has encompassed numerous nations all over
the world. By that time democratically minded political scientists in these post-Soviet
countries regarded party democracy as “the best pattern of democratic governance ever
elaborated by the human civilization”.2 In Russia
multiparty political system has been declared the ultimate goal of political
transformation by politicians who were fiercely struggling with communist
“nomenclature” for power after the amendment to the Soviet Union’s
Constitution in March 1990 that canceled the guaranteed monopoly of the Communist Party of
the Soviet Union (CPSU). In the early 1990s, many from scholars and policy makers believed
that processes of transition, once launched, would unfold naturally, driven with their own
internal logic and impetus. Great expectations of inevitable and smooth transition to
democracy have been bound to newly emerged parties widely expected to play a fundamental
role in constructing modern representative democracy.3
Some Russian scholars still keep considering multiparty system a
mainspring of the political process in the country.
Of course, they have been not unique in their faith in transformational
capacity of political parties given that at present there is no non-party democracy in the
world. Political parties are believed to connect civil society and the state, espousing
the claims of the one and enforcing the rules of the other. As Philippe C. Schmitter
contends, constitutional representative democracy controlled by multiparty and contestable
elections serves as a reference point in democratic transformation for post-authoritarian
societies in any cultural geographic region all over the world.
Post-authoritarian transformations of the heterogeneous third wave
generated a great variety of political regimes that formally correspond to such minimal
criteria of democracy as suffrage, regular elections, and political parties in opposition,
yet differ substantially from western party democracies with their commitment to market
economy, human rights and freedom. Some of them are successively working on to join
community of liberal democracies, others have lagged behind, but the most part of them
don’t show any advancement in democratic consolidation. They have amorphous parties,
monopolized inefficient economics, inflated corrupted administration, and low level of
social security and guaranties.
Newly independent states in post-Soviet space compose a part of these
about 120 “electoral democracies”, and western models of parties, elections, and
other democratic institutions not only determine the framework for scholarly disputes and
speculations, but provide reference points for politicians.
However, after 10 years that firstly emerged parties were officially
registered and started performing as political actors a discrepancy grows evident between
assumptions about normative models of ‘how it should be’, borrowed from western
experience, and inefficiency of many new multiparty systems on the way to democratic
consolidation. So, for instance, after the third ‘free and fair’ election for
the Russia’s State Duma on party lists in 1999 pessimistic judgments of the prospects
for further democratic development in Russia have become even more frequent than
optimistic ones.4
Post-Soviet space renders a rather unique object to test the
applicability of general theories of political parties in contexts different from the
Western ones and to study how contexts are shaping the models of parties emerged there.
NIS have got one and the same point of departure for transition - they all are post
Soviet, they all have the common Soviet legacy of peoples who lived for
a pretty long time in the same state with the same political institutions. However, the
entity of the Soviet Union consisted of parts that differ in many ways. Firstly, they do
it greatly in pre-Soviet history. Secondly, duration of the Soviet rule with uneven levels
of social and economic development, various rates of urbanization etc. means a lot.
Thirdly, there are variability in ethnical composition, cultures and mentality paradigms
that were taken by the account while the current regimes came to power after decay of the
Soviet Empire.
By now, electoral democracies of successor states for unified Soviet
Socialist Republics demonstrate diverse trajectories of development. Some of them, namely
the Baltic States, have evidently made substantial progress on both democratization and
economic transitions. Others, including most of the Central Asian countries (except
Kyrgyzstan), Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, don’t advance in both spheres and have
authoritarian or semi-authoritarian governments and statist economies. The third group of
countries, consisting of Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, Kyrgyzstan, and Georgia, is hovering
uneasily between success and failure.
Thus, the countries of the former Soviet Union have had such disparate
experiences of transition that the very unified concept of post-Soviet space may be put
now under revision. It is widely argued that the Baltic region, Central Asia, the
Caucasus, the region of Moldova, Russia and other Slavic states be better understood for
their particularities rather than for their commonalties.
Therefore, a comparative study of common features and peculiarities of
political parties and party systems in NIS gives great opportunity to test existing
theoretical models in variety of contexts: from the western oriented Baltic states to
those of Central Asia with their strong archaic biases.
In multitude of countries of former Soviet Empire, the Russia’s
transitional context seems to be the most complicated. This makes it an attractive object
of investigation, while, if we seek to develop a generalized framework for the comparative
analysis of parties in post-Soviet space, we must expand our scope to cover all the
plurality of context variables.
Usually, a comparative analysis of specific empirical cases is based on
a certain theoretical framework employed as a tool to interpret contextual realities.
However, there is no single general party theory that could be used for multivariable
conceptual framework without risk of misrepresenting the nature of parties under analysis.
The party theory is a rather loose and mobile sphere of theories and hypotheses tied each
to its own sample of research objects, variables, assumptions, and limitations. Once
appeared a hypothesis provokes a new series of studies, some of which supports it, whereas
the other – denies, depending on diversity of samples, assumptions and features of
input data– time, region, form of government, electoral system, and so on. They
don’t conflict with each other since they deal with substantively different objects,
but rather supplement each other contributing to general body of knowledge.
Which from many party theories and/or hypotheses we should select and
implant into our framework aiming to get meaningful results for heterogeneous contexts of
post-Soviet space? If we choose the one for our framework, we risk to neglect context
variables disregarded as non-significant in original context that inspired hypothesis, but
crucially important for our case study. Exploring the same reality with different set of
variables, we would arrive to different deductions. This is the old problem of measuring
device and error of measure. So, for example, we can analyze voter's alignment at the
voting by “party lists” on proportional representation ballot and judge from
results about scope and extend of cleavages existing in the society. However, if we
neglect that in our case, there is only 1% of constituent's trusts to parties completely.
At the same time, there is a huge proportion of 76% that doesn’t trust to
politicians. Thus, to the opinion of some analysts, there could be up to 30-40% of voters
that can be mobilized to vote for anybody or anything by means of administrative
resources, mass Media, and money. Anyway, we don’t come to reliable conclusions.
That is why it seems more practical in our study to follow the way of
constructing conceptual framework proposed by k. Janda in his seminal work Political
parties: A Cross-national Survey.5 He
identified a relatively small number of basic concepts that seemed to encompass most of
specific observations that scholars were making about parties, and, thus, to provide
sufficient explanatory power of the model.
Being inspired by this experience, we have preferred a theoretically
neutral framework, not bound to any existing explicit hypotheses, but providing data to
formulate appropriate ones by results of research. This approach renders also a freedom to
any logically possible theoretical interpretation of obtained data.
Another crucial problem in the comparative analysis of political
parties is what doing we mean when we speak about parties in our countries, what is the
object of our study? What definition are we using: a broad one, or a narrow? The choice
depends primarily on the goal of study. In our case, we seek to investigate party politics
in a specific context of post-Soviet transformation. So we need to include in
consideration not only these public associations that fit into formal judicial
requirements to parties, but all those who are pursuing a goal of placing their avowed
representatives in government positions, are eligible to nominate candidates and take part
in elections on “party lists”.6
However, the sample of parties selected in this way is too large for
practical research. So, we have restricted our consideration to parties that operate in
national politics and have excluded regional parties. This choice has another essential
reason. Regional politics in 89 subjects of the Russian Federation differ from each other
greatly that allows some analysts to talk about 89 different political regimes in Russia
with their own peculiar party contexts. The proportional representation ballot that makes
legal basis for party politics on national level is adopted in only few Russia’s
regions. So, comparative regional party politics in Russia makes its a special subject
worth of particular study.
Russian political scientists in the search for
adequate pattern of modern political system for post-Soviet Russia address often to
historical experience of liberal democracies in North America and West Europe, that
constitute the ‘first wave’ of modernization. The process of ‘natural’
modernization that was beginning in the XIIth century set in motion a series of social,
political, and intellectual transformations. The harmony of development in economy,
politics, law, culture, and social relations (civil society) was ensured by commonality of
their roots in Weltanschauung of Modernity. Modernity has considered man the center
of the universe. It emphasized the dignity of man, his right on privacy and
self-actualization. Modernity declared the unity of individual liberty and responsibility,
equality and social justice. Party democracy has been an aftermath of this long and
consistent process of ‘natural’ political modernization.
Russia was the first nation in the world who tried the model of forced,
catching up modernization. The so-called ‘imperialist’ model of
modernization has developed in the period of reforms by Peter the Great, dated to end of
XVIIth- beginning of XVIIIth. From then on this model has been practiced by Russian
governments for about three hundred years, every time when the next system crisis revealed
that Russia dropped behind the West Europe in technology and arms. Modernization by means
of extreme mobilizing efforts exhausts resources. Severe exploitation of people suppresses
personal initiatives and uproots social relations, which used to serve prerequisites for
‘natural’ modernization processes, like in the West. All kind of conditions to
provide rise of economy and social welfare lead to progress in science and technology, as
well as to democratization of political institutions. Imposed, unilateral character of
modernization deepened the gulf between people and state power. As impulses from
government weakened with time, uncompleted processes of modernization gradually attenuated
in society that kept in whole being traditional and resisted to violently imposed reforms,
and system crisis reproduced itself.
One of the most significant attempts to westernize political regime via
establishing a representative legislative body if even with restricted consulting
prerogatives, and multiparty system is dated to the crisis of 1905 caused by Russia’s
defeat in Russia-Japan war and social disturbance. The Tsar’s Manifest from 6 August
1905 proclaimed establishing the First State Duma. Soon afterward a decree appeared on the
temporary rules about ‘society and unions’ permitting to organize political
parties. In the beginning of XXth century, there were 56 all-Russian parties.7 It is also worth to mention that Russian scholars of that
time were carefully analyzing American and West European experience of party politics in
democratic development. The famous book by M.Ostrogorski, who, by the way, was not only a
very productive and multilateral scholar, but also the deputy of the State Duma,
‘Democracy and Political Parties Organization', appeared in Paris in 1898.
However, the upsurge of multiparty system and hopes for democratization
of Russian politics were ultimately constrained by the reconstitution of imperial power.
The State Duma did not become a forum for political dialogue and a genuine legislative
body. As a consequence, the authoritarian regime of Russian Monarchy did not sustain the
next crisis of 1917 and collapsed.
After communists came to power on the wave of crisis in 1917, they
resorted to the same model of imposed forced modernization with its first priority of
proletarian hegemony. The latter meant ultra-forced reconstruction and growth of national
industrial power in total-Soviet mobilized society in order to achieve political and
military domination of communist Russia in the world. All the independent from one-party
state structures of civil society were destroyed or transformed into decorative
subsidiaries of power, like eternized official trade unions. The court from institute to
interpret law was made a part of repressive mechanism of power. Unlike in western nations,
where industrial revolution was accompanied by extension of individual economic,
intellectual and political freedom, and released the capacity of individuals to
spontaneous actions and self-actualization, Russian model combined the technological
modern with statist economy, social archaic and coercion. Conservation of non-freedom for
the sake of achieving goals as fast as possible was the price paid for desired
breakthrough in technology. Inefficiency of this model got evident in the late
industrialization phase, when individual became the main resource of production. Already
by 1970s this model was exhausted, the next crisis arrived and resulted in breakdown of
communist regime followed by unprecedented de-modernization of Russia.
Communist rule has left after its failure leveled,
totally depending on state Soviet society. This short and humble pre-Soviet experience of
pore parliamentarian practices and party politics in Russia did not left significant
vestige in post-Soviet political culture and mass political consciousness. On the
contrary, whereas life for more then 70 years under communist rule with ideological
pressure and brainwashing by totalitarian propaganda, along with effect of other, material
variables of Soviet context on several generations of people have made much more in
forging a definite Soviet identification and mentality.
Demolition of the former administrative system before that new
democratic institutions appeared contributed to clannishness of Russian politics, and
turned it into a space of underhand bargaining between diverse elite clans for benefits
that is preventing or substantively interfering the development of free market, pluralism
and democracy. After 10 years of economic reforms and privatization of state economy
Russia occupies today the 93rd place on the list of 123 countries by indicator of economy
freedom, nears Colombia, Papua-New Guinea, and Tanzania.8
Alienation of the people from the real political participation and
fragmentation of amorphous unstructured society after it has lost the Soviet identity
contributed to rise of what R.Sakwa defines as: ‘regime politics’, occupying the
space between an ill–formed state system and rudimentary civil society’.9 The regime system that replaced one-party state has
developed certain mechanisms of the control over the representative institutes formation
and has built in the set of these mechanisms also political parties, including the
Communist Party of Russian Federation (CPRF), the successor party of the CPSU.
The dissolution of the power of the CPSU during perestroika was
accompanied by the upsurge of numerous movements covering social, environmental, gender
and other issues, and emergence of first political popular fronts and proto-parties. By
late 1990, there were at least 457 political or politicized organizations in Russia. The
end of the CPSU’s constitutionally guaranteed monopoly on power laid by the amendment
to Constitution in March 1990 allowed them to legalize in developing ‘regime
politics’. However, they lacked institutional framework in which parties could
operate.
Actually multiparty system has been introduced as institute of
political system by the B.Yeltsin’s decree that imposed a new electoral system. This
decree provided for a mix system. It meant a catch for non-party participants. The
traditional first-past-the-post single-member constituencies would elect one half of
mandates in the 450-member the State Duma (the Lower House) of the newly established
bicameral Federal Assembly. But the other one would be ‘reserved’ for party
lists according to a weighted system of proportional representation. B.Yeltsin expected
that in the situation of acute political crisis of October 1993, when another presidential
decree on security measures during electoral campaign actually excluded opposing parties
from participation in ballot, such ‘rules of game’ would ensure the loyal to him
majority in the State Duma of the first convocation. Up to his expectations, it would have
to contribute to legitimization of new system of power, which later was introduced by the
new Constitution of Russia.
On the eve of election 1995 the power makes attempt to transform the
multiparty system into two-party system, in which one “right” party would be
headed by prime-minister, another, ‘left’ - by the Duma speaker. These parties,
the ‘left and right hand’ of power, as they were nicknamed by mass media, upon
the strategy of political technologists should occupy the main part of electoral space and
push behind the 5 per cent margin all those who will not adhere them. Such a party system
fits a theory of corporatism by Philippe C. Schmitter. There is a definition of
corporatism as ‘a system of interests representation in which the constituent units
are organized into a limited number of compulsory, non-competitive … categories,
recognized or licensed (if not created) by the state and granted a deliberate
representational monopoly within their respective categories in exchange for observing
certain controls on their selection of leaders and articulations of demands and
supports.’10
The following stage in multiparty system development became the third
election to the State Duma of 1999. Judging by the electoral campaign one can came to
conclusion that the new president also sees the main instrumental role of multiparty
system in a ‘vertical of power’, that is vigorously being built for him, in
making the Duma servile.
Three months before the ballot and right after Vladimir Putin became
Prime Minister; loyal candidates to presidential team created a pro-Kremlin
electoral block ‘Unity’. It was also known as ‘Medved’ or the Bear
movement. This political conglomerate succeeded in using administrative resource and
control over mass media in scale comparable only to B.Yeltsin’s presidential campaign
1996, carried the ‘Unity’ into the State Duma in a close second to the Communist
Party in the national PR ballot. Soon after ‘Unity’ was transformed into a party
with 41 regional organizations comparable in number of the members with the CPRF, its
leader, S. Shoigu declared the ‘Unity’ 's strategic goal: ‘We should create
a party, which will make political resource of power’. The ideology of unconditioned
support of power compensates to ‘Unity’ lack of its own program, without which
the party is inconceivable in party democracy. Former ‘parties of power’ like
‘Choice of Russia’ and ‘Our Home is Russia’ were created around first
figures in government; they lost political weight, as soon as the president from the stage
removed these figures.11 The ‘Unity’ identifies
itself with presidential power as the only real one in Russia’s political system
context.
At present ‘democracy of disorder ‘ of B.Yeltsin’s epoch
is being rapidly replaced by new, more consistent political regime, whose ideology is Order.
To promote this Order this regime requires a new ‘leading and directing’ party,
a somewhat remake of the CPSU in post-Soviet context. Its occurrence became possible
because in this new post-Soviet context an individual did not acquired self-sufficiency in
regard to power. At absence of independent court, even the possession of property does not
release individual from complete dependence on power. This unlimited might of power
regenerates inevitably corruption of bureaucracy and servility of politicians. The power
still remains the main source of well being for citizens in exchange for their fidelity
and obedience. At the same time, from the power come essential threats. Vladimir Putin
openly favored the “Unity” in front of other parties on the eve of
parliamentarian ballot in 1999. Thus, the “Unity” got a convincing victory over
numerous politicians and political associations. Up to now, many of these losers have been
showing a hot desire to join this new ‘party of power’. In sum,
“Unity” started including its competitors who lost election. Among the letter,
there is majority of ‘nomenclature’ formations that pretended in different time
to play a ruling party role.12
The next step on the way of transforming the multiparty system into an
obedient tool of the Kremlin is the ongoing attempt to create a new loyal to president
party ‘Russia’ under the acting Duma speaker and member of the CPRF G.Seleznev.
One of the leaders of ‘Russia’’s Moscow branch, retired general and
V.Putin’s trustee at presidential election, has disclosed its purpose as follows:
“President needs a bearing, and “Russia” is called to become this
bearing.”13 A task of new structure in the strategy
of the Kremlin is to take away right supporters of “opposing” the Kremlin CPRF
and to make the party relief in Russia even more flat.
Another move of the Kremlin in this direction is the bill already
forwarded to the State Duma according to which the number of deputies is limited to three
hundred. Two hundred of them were elected by the single-member constituencies, and 100
were offered through party lists, while the hurdle for winners were leveled up to 7 per
cent.
In the system of interactions between society and power, the latter
tries to make multiparty system to play a role of its intermediary and agent in society
and even in government affairs. Thus, the multi-partism's function is to supervise and
control the state machine, as it usually is done in average party democracies. But, at the
same time, the power keeps attempts to convert different politicians into its "agents
of influence" with additional functions to supervise and control the very society. Of
course, any power immanently seeks to boundless expansion. However, if in liberal
democracies its ambitions are restricted by maintaining principles of separation of
powers, checks and balances, independence of court, as well as by really competitive party
system and anti-totalitarian individualist attitudes of the majority of population, in
today’s Russia there are no such regulators.
From all political institutes parties steadily rate
the least trust. In June, 1997, six years after the law on parties was accepted,
accordingly to public-opinion poll only 1 percent of respondents from nationwide sample
have declared complete trust to them, 4 percent - avowed trust ‘to a certain
extent’, while the mistrust was showed by 76 percent.14
In Spain, during the period 1971 -1976, the share of the voters considering political
parties are useful, has grown from 12 percent up to 67 percent. 15
Marginality of parties is due to great part to principally non-party
character of Russian Constitution, if even the Article 13, Section 3 declares that
“Political plurality and multiparty system are endorsed in Russian Federation”.16 (By the way, this is the only mention of parties in the
Constitution. The law on parties being made ready on the eve of election in 1995 could not
get approval of the Council of Federation, the upper chamber of the Federal Assembly).
Functions of political parties in state power are limited to
legislative activity in the State Duma, whereas this low chamber of the legislative body
is greatly depending on the Council of Federation, which is formed, and functioning on
completely other rules. Parties have no even abstract opportunity to translate demands of
voters into process of decision making, for, neither parliamentary majority nor
parliamentary party coalition are allowed to form government or even to control its
policy. So, party competition for votes in electoral campaign and the ballot itself lose
the basic purpose, to which it serves in party democracy, that is to change both the
government that has lost public support and his policy. In Russia the change of government
used to be dependent mostly on the will of president, but not on the results of election.
Therefore, the voters miss such decisive for rational vote criterion, as rating parties by
accounting actions of the government, completed by this party (or these parties), at the
end of its term of office.
Besides, from plurality of parties only four have contesting all three
elections in 1993, 1995 and 1999 (CPRF, Liberal Democratic Party of V.Zhirinovsky, Yabloko
and Women of Russia, the latter have cleared the 5% hurdle only in 1993). While each
election offers voters new choices, they have no basis for evaluating the past record and
credibility of competing parties.
Parties with no institutionalized opportunity to realize their
programs, even in case of the victory in election, cannot supervise government while in
the State Duma. In fact, they don’t carry any responsibility for social consequences
of government policy, and are compelled to mirror the attitude of society to the State
Duma.
According to public-opinion polls, since February 2000, there have been
only 3 percent of electorate, who believed that the Duma could make necessary decisions
and adopt laws. Among 17 percent there were beliefs, that, though the Duma may discuss
over necessary laws and make decisions, it can not control their realization; and 60
percent were convinced that the Duma has been mostly engaged in useless discussions and
quarrels with the executive power. It is worth to note that the Duma deputies also
don’t perceive themselves as carriers of power but as fully dependent on “the
Kremlin” – notation under which the President, his Administration and his close
circle of advisers and friends are implied.
The role assigned to parties in regime politics by Russian Constitution
and actual distribution of power transforms motives of their participating in politics.
The victory at election from mean to realize a certain program becomes the self-sufficient
purpose. The parliamentary status allows a party to participate in political bargaining
with power to promote interests of these or other groups of business by voting the bills.
It helps these political-business groupings to use material resources of the state, as
well as its administrative and telecommunication structure in order to support their
organizational structures. And at last, but not at least, parliamentarians can constantly
be present on TV screens into federal information space, which becomes the main form of
being for political actors. Those, who loose it, disappear from TV screens and are
destined to oblivion. Assistants carefully support TV and other Media images. Deputies in
the second Duma had 25.000 paid assistants and 23.000 more as volunteers.
Party fractions in the Duma, including the CPRF, behave as private
political enterprises persuading, first of all their own corporate interests. As some mass
media contend the legislative activities becomes for many deputies a stable and sure
resource to full up personal and party budget.17
Despite the mentioned above well-based preparations for
contacts with the Media people, there is constant negative image of the State Duma
activities in public opinion. The reason of it is rooted in their broadly proclaimed
opposition to the Kremlin. But in reality, party fractions in the State Duma have never
assorted to their constitutional right to vote non-confidence to Prime-Minister, evidently
fearing to fail in inevitably following re-elections with possibilities to lose privileges
of parliamentary status.
While all profitable economic activities are controlled by the regime
system, where political elite is not separated from the administrative one, politics
becomes an attractive sphere of capital investment, creating a stable rise of prices for
electoral business services. About 400 agencies of political PR, advertisement and
consulting with, on self-evaluation, nearly 17-20 thousand people involved in this
business were functioning in Russia by 1995.
In party democracy parties offer in election alternative programs in
exchange for support of the voters, and the voters estimate, this from the programs
represents better their demands. In Russia, voters are free to decide what party on the
ballot to vote for, but they do not have any choice that could really change anything in
their social economic situation, could represent, and protect their interests.18 The share of those who believe that election is an
effective mean to influence the power reduced in period 1995-1998 from 22,4 per cent to
11,9 per cent. When rational social and economic interests to be compared to a party
program are still not formed in Russian society, it is bad, but can not continue for a
long time. When a party at the same has no opportunity to realize its own program, it is a
puppet party. Many other distinctions between party programs concede the place to such
factors, as an administrative resource, professionalism of political technologists,
popularity of the three persons heading the party list, and also money, which frequently
are capable to provide all of them. The deposit fee required for a party to qualify for
the proportional representation list, is 200,000 signatures or 25,000 times the minimum
monthly wage. The real costs of campaigning are much higher. Lacking stable sources of
funding and offices independent parties can not stand concurrence of those that are
supported by administration and business groups.
Party program turns into auxiliary and the least demanded by both
candidates and voters attribute of electoral technology. An enormous role in forging
outcome of election acquires electronic mass media. They make excessive traditional tools
of electorate mobilization, and, thus, abolish necessity of mass party organization. The
people vote for image created by the experts in political advertising, which influences an
ordinary voter much more effectively, than the program or real contribution of a party,
especially, when a party, like majority of parties in Russia, has no long record and
steady reputation.
Significance of the control over mass-media and the scale of
manipulating Russian public opinion got evident in electoral campaign of 1999, when the
just organized 'Unity' without any intelligible program has obtained second in number of
the mandates place in the State Duma.
Society, whose demand parties claim to represent in
political bargaining with power, remains in its total indifferent to politics in general
and to party politics, in particular. Under the level of poverty today lives about 60
millions (41,2 per cent) of population, and about 20 millions in addition are in the
status of absolute poverty. The politically active (by self-evaluation) part of
population, according to data of the Center of Social Dynamics (Institute of Social
Political Study, Russian Academy of Science), does not exceed 7 per cent. About
three-fourths characterizes themselves as ‘passive observers of political life’,
reading newspapers, listening radio and watching for events on TV. Others have defined
themselves as absolutely (8 per cent) or nearly (13 per cent) not interested in politics.19 From young people making 20-25 per cent of the votes, only
5-7 per cent regularly takes part in election.20 By
results of a public opinion pull in March, 1999 about 1,0 per cent respondents in the
nationwide sample have specified, that within past year they personally participated in
political parties’ activities, meetings, demonstrations, strikes. This number is
approximately equal to number of the activists and volunteers in political parties plus
political new makers.
Russians have a plenitude of parties from which to choose. 43 electoral
associations and blocs took part in election of 1995. By the deadline for the registration
of political parties, a year in advance of the 1999 State Duma election 141 political
groups met registration requirements and 26 from them were running for seats in the Duma.
However, deficiency of credit in public opinion to parties and to their will and ability
to move forward positive transformation contribute towards that electoral behavior have
acquired little differentiated and very contradictory, imposed nature. The basis of electoral behavior consist of
either ‘choice of the lesser from two evils’ or a peculiar form of
‘protest voting’ that has spontaneous and frequently unpredictable character.
Interest to politics descents between elections, political positions declared by voters
one way of other erode with disillusioning in activities of elected.
Even assumptions of the ‘core’, partisan electorates of the
parties with most long records about not even programs of ‘their’ parties, but
about their most general symbolic values are far not adequate. So, for instance, 21 per cent of ‘Yabloko’ partisans in
election 1995 take for the best one the Soviet political system that existed till 1991,
while 11 per cent of the CPRF partisans considered as the best the western democracy. This
kind of ‘disordered’ mind is one of consequences of lengthy alienation of people
from real political participation where individual has to analyze and to make choice.
Prerequisite of party democracy is that a significant part of electorate is
politically socialized, that is has interest to political participation, sufficient
knowledge on politics and politicians, values and political will. At present, there is no
such electorate in Russia.
Attempt to modernize Russian political system by
borrowing the western institute of multipartism but with other goals and in utterly other
context yielded to different results. Parties did not become the main intermediaries
between power and society. By national-wide public opinion poll in 1999, only 2 per cent
of population are fully satisfied with existing political system, whereas 90 per cent
contends that it does not guarantee their civil rights and their interests.21
Parties did not become either mass organization applying to definite social
groups as it was typical to the epoch of class struggle in industrializing society and
development of democracy, or universal parties of voters in late industrial society
applying to all social groups. Instead, a party system evolved that has no significant
social roots. Its multiplicity is not mirroring the social cleavages but projects numerous
clans of political, economic and administrative elite competing for influence on the
Kremlin, privileges and more profitable place in the regime system.22
As R.Rose mentions:
‘The supply-side initiatives of political elite are the primary cause of Duma seats changing hands. There is a big turnover in the number of parties on the ballot from one election to the next. In the 1993 Duma election, there were 13 parties on the proportional representation ballot; in 1995, there were 43; and in 1999, the number was down to 26.’23
For elite participation in party politics is a mean
of self-identification. More over, election is one of the forms of intra-elite realignment
in struggle for corporate interests and for improving their placement in the regime
politics of super-presidential republic, where, unlike in western pluralist democracies,
there are no efficient structures and transparent legal mechanisms for lobbying grope
interests. Among those who are registered to run for seats in the State Duma are public
association that actually are not political. There are trade unions, like Russian
‘Sea Congress’; movement, like ‘Miners of Russia’, ‘Engineering
Progress of Russia’; business associations, like ‘All-Russian Union for Support
of Small and Middle Business’; movements, like ‘Development of
Undertaking’; interest groups, like ‘My family’, ‘Education is
Russia’s Future’, and so on.
Some parties espoused a more or less clear political outlook, such as
the CPRF, the market oriented Right Forces Union, or the Zhirinovsky’s LDPR. Others,
such as the ‘Unity’ and the ‘Fatherland –All Russia’ claim to
represent everyone. But no one more or less significant party demands return to former
political system and statist economy. A discussion organized by the Carnegie Moscow Center
on the eve of election in 1999 revealed that the economic programs of the main rivals, the
CPRF, ‘Fatherland- All Russia’, ‘Union of Right Forces’ and
‘Yabloko’ overlap for three-fourths. Most of parties declare political centrism,
which, however, in regime politics turns into unconditional support of power.24 The existing nature of power, that is nontransparent,
unaccountable and restricted to private, top-level intrigues politics, suits in general
all of them.
Divergences appear in the sphere of real corporate interests, like privileges in business,
protectionism in trade, taxes burden distribution, antimonopoly legislation,
appropriation, quotas, guaranties, licenses and so on. A well-known expert on modern
Russian elite O. Gaman-Golutvina maintains that even parties that declare principal
opposition to power, like the CPRF, are no more than pseudo-opposition, for many of their
fragments are involved in different ‘clan-corporate’ structures.25
Another expert O. Krishtanovskaja contends that current ruling elite
consists for 70 per cent of sub-elite of former ‘nomenclature’, and, in
particular, party elite – for 57 per cent. In government, the share is 74 per cent.26 This continuity contributes to reproduction of informal,
shadow methods in intra-elite interests compromising, inherited from Soviet times.
Corporate solidarity is much stronger then divergence of outlooks on governance priority,
and therefore ideological conflict turns into a decorative extraneous controversy reckoned
upon ‘passive observers over political life’.
Russian multiparty system, not having any substantial basis in society
and occupying a marginal place in the structure of state power, is more dependent on the
Kremlin than vice versa. For the Kremlin it serves a certain kind of security net
preventing that excessive power ambitions of elite and, to some part, a public
dissatisfaction do not grow up to amplitude threatening the existence of ‘regime
system’.
Of course, still in this quality multiparty system contributes to
social and political stability which is an indispensable precondition of democracy
development. However, in the country with underdeveloped civil society this stability
serves also to conservation of the routine procedures of decision making in the close and
nontransparent for public sphere of intro-elite interactions through bargaining group
interests of corporate clans.
Therefore, the multiparty system itself hardly can be taken for an
active, independent and dominating subject of political modernization. Given its unanimous
declarative elan to a blurry center and loyalty to power, it could rather commit to
preservation of status quo and reproduction of regime politics, then to democratic
innovations.
High expectations related to modernizing potency of political parties
came from normative models of western party democracies developed in the process of
’natural’ modernization, and also from assumption that Russia is starting the
way covered by western democracies. Therefore, Russian parties are often regarded as
proto-parties of their western analogue that with time will develop into the full-grown
and will take similar place in politics. R.Sakwa, one of the keenest western experts on
Russian politics in his analysis comes to assertion:
The Russian party system is still in its infancy and, despite the tendency to force social processes that is a defining feature of post-communist transitions, there is no reason to believe that what took decades in the West can be accomplished in a matter of years in Russia.27
However, it seems that Russian parties are not
proto-, as well as they are not quasi–parties in regard to western pattern. They are
not also a deviant model of western parties as they emerged in maturing civil society in
epoch of industrial revolution. They represent quite different type, developed in
post-communist context in different historic time.
Today’s Russian multipartism is a child of quasi-democratic
‘regime system’ aggregated from remains of decayed communist rule. Those, who
managed to occupy a profitable place in chaotic consolidation of symbiotic clans from old
bureaucracy, public politicians and new financial and business elite emerged after
'nomenclature' appropriation of statist property and power, are not interested either in
democratic transformation and a free market or in new radical redistribution of power and
property. Their strategic goal is to retain and to maximize obtained privileges in
present-day regime politics, and the multiparty system is a mean to attain this goal.
In the countries of first wave, political modernization was owing to
internal impulses. In the second wave the state and reformist part of ruling elite, who
gave triggered ‘revolution from above’ became the main subjects of
transformation. They were stimulated by aspiration to reach the level of world leaders.
Even more important role-play of political and business elite can be found in countries of
the third wave. Where they have political will combined with social responsibility, like
in some countries of Asia, the impressive achievements in modernization appeared. Other
countries of the third wave transit to category of ‘broken-down’ states with
degrading economy and decaying structures of power, that cannot provide elementary order
and security of people.
In Russian, the power is traditionally and de jure concentrated around
the person of president. The Kremlin, who is controlling at present not only executive
power, army and police, court and nationwide mass media, but all those who are usually
identified as ruling elite, including top businessmen, public politicians and bureaucrats
of high rank, becomes the main political actor. Given general alienation of society from
politics and distrust to any institute of state power, the high personal rating of
president V.Putin (64 per cent in June. 2000) legitimized this regime politics in public
opinion. So, the prospects of political modernization in Russia for this decade are a
hostage of president’s personality.
For Russia accomplishing the late industrial stage of modernization and
transition to postindustrial information society is a crucial problem of its survival in
contemporary world as an independent state. So in countries of first wave modernization
was based on internal resources and politics of rigid state sovereignty and protectionism.
In the rapidly globalising world of the end of XXth centuries chances of the third wave
countries depend on their ability to integrate into ‘community of democracy’,
the core of which constitute post-industrial countries of North America, Europe and Japan.
Prerequisite of Russia integrating in global economic system of democratic community is to
make its internal law, informational, social and political space compatible to general for
‘community’ rules of game. This external factor of transformation is much more
puissant than internal chaotic and contradictory impulses.
If the processes of political democratic consolidation in Russia will
go on, despite the current inconsistent strategy of the Kremlin, along with them
multiparty system will undergo transformation. However, the direction of this possible
transformation is obviously not European political parties of modernity.