Comparing Presidential Elections in Russia (2000) and Ukraine (2004)

SHAPING VOTERS’ BEHAVIOR IN NASCENT DEMOCRACIES: COMPARING PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS IN RUSSIA (2000) AND UKRAINE (2004) OKSANA POLYUGA MA in Russian, European and Eurasian Studies, University of Toronto, [email protected] Abstract Introduction The paper analyzes and compares how This study concentrates on the analysis the power elite in post-Soviet Russia and comparison of two presidential and Ukraine exercise their power in elections: Russia in 2000 and Ukraine in order to shape voters’ behavior and 2004. The reason behind this choice is the win the elections. While approaching author’s belief that both events marked a turning point in the modern political this question, the author analyzes history of those countries. The Russian common strategies employed by the and Ukrainian presidents, Boris Yeltsin ruling elite in Russia and Ukraine: and Leonid Kuchma respectively, had control over media, abuse of the so served two terms and were about to leave called “administrative resource,” their offices. Besides, as we argue here, by suppression of opposition, and the end of the second term in office, these manipulation of opinion polls results. presidents shared common fears and However, the elections led to different security concerns related to the protection results: in the case of Russia 2000, the of the [political] “family” business which incumbent regime reached its goal and would be threatened if an ‘unfriendly’ won the elections, whereas in the case candidate came to power. of Ukraine 2004, the power elite lost. Given the power elites’ similar The research reveals similar patterns in approach to shaping voters behavior, applying electoral strategies by elites in the paper attempts to answer why the Russia 1999-2000 and Ukraine 2004. outcomes of the two elections in These strategies are the following: question differ and what it tells us establishing control over the media, about democratic development in these suppressing opposition and resorting to two countries. the abuse of administrative resource. IConsidering such similar approached to nelections, the work attempts to answer a set of its key questions: why were the t outcomes of these two elections so 65 different? Why did the Russian authorities According to the authors, transition to win the 2000 elections, and their democracy is complete when the Ukrainian counterparts lose? What can be “government comes to power that is the direct result of a free and a popular vote.”2 learned from the Ukrainian election and Discussions on where the democratic what are the future implications for ruling transition went in post-Soviet countries, elites in other post-Soviet countries? including Russia and Ukraine, are still taking place. Scholars are divided. Some When describing the strategies applied by believe that the transition is over, while elites during Russian and Ukrainian others argue that it has not yet been elections we use several terms: political completed. Oleh Havrylyshyn is one of technologies, electoral techniques, those arguing that the transition to election/electoral strategies, and democracy in some post-Soviet countries, manipulative measures. In the context of like Russia and Belarus, is over.3 By that this paper these terms mean the same, and he means that those countries have turned they are aimed at shaping the behavior of away from a democratic path, and will the electorate in the presidential elections never, or not in the near future, be back on analysed here. the same track. While being less categorical regarding the future of post- Where did the Transition go: the state of communist transition as Havrylyshyn, democratic development in Russia 2000 Volkov and Ryabchuk refer to the post- and Ukraine 2004 Soviet regimes of Russia and Ukraine as authoritarian and semi-authoritarian rules Russia and Ukraine chose the path of respectively.4 At the same time, the democracy after the collapse of the Soviet majority of scholars remain more Union in 1991. By the end of the 90s both optimistic arguing that the transition countries had undoubtedly made certain towards democracy is a time-consuming steps away from the Soviet model of governance that is nowadays referred to by many as a totalitarian regime. At the Communist Europe, (The John Hopkins University same time, neither Russia nor Ukraine Press, 1996), (part 1), 5. prior to the presidential elections of 2000 2 Linz and Stepan, p.3. 3 and 2004 respectively had reached a Oleh Havrylyshyn, academic lecture at CREES, University of Toronto, Fall 2004. consolidated democracy in its classic 4 Vladimir Volkov, “Russian President Putin Moves interpretation. Juan Linz and Alfred Toward Authoritarian Rule,” World Socialist Web Stepan identify “consolidated democracy” Site, 3 June 2000, available at as a political situation where democracy http://www.wsws.org/articles/2000/jun2000/put- 1 j03.shtml. becomes “the only game in town.” Mykola Ryabchuk, “From ‘Dysfunctional’ to ‘Blackmail’ State: Paradoxes of the Post-Soviet th 1 Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan, Problems of Transition” (Text of the 38 Annual Shevchenko Democratic Transition and Consolidation: Lecture, delivered by Mykola Ryabchuk at the Southern Europe, South America, and Post- University of Alberta on March 14, 2004). 66 process and, therefore, still underway in Wilson’s statement that, in post-Soviet Russia and Ukraine. countries, the final act of voting could remain relatively ‘free and fair’ after the Alternatively, Andrew Wilson and struggle for voters’ attention is won.10 In Michael McFaul identify post-Soviet other words, in post-Soviet “managed countries as those developing their own democracies” it is the pre-election stage types of democracy. In his book Virtual that matters. It is during this stage that the Politics, Wilson refers to Russia and ruling elite struggle to shape the Ukraine as ‘directed’, ‘virtual’ or ‘faked’ electorate’s behavior, and the opposition democracies.5 He argues that much of struggles to contest the power of the what passes for democratic participation authorities. in these, and most of the countries of the former Soviet Union, is entirely fake, a It is normal practice in truly democratic carefully choreographed performance countries for the elite to attempt to shape designed to maintain the political status the electorate’s behavior to a larger or quo.6 At the same time, Wilson tries to smaller extent in order to win elections. remain as optimistic as possible stating However, as this paper highlights, the that democracy in countries like Russia elections in Russia and Ukraine were and Ukraine is not yet dead, “it is just characterized by widespread usage of distorted.”7 Michael McFaul calls Russia a undemocratic ways of shaping the ‘managed democracy’– judging by the behavior of voters, forcing them to betray way the elections are conducted there.8 their true political beliefs. Such force may be implemented through misinformation and even threat from those in power. Thomas Carothers argues that in the late Undemocratically conducted elections, as 90s both Russia and Ukraine “have the 2004 presidential election experience adopted the institutional forms of in Ukraine has shown, do not always lead democracy, including regular elections, to undemocratic outcomes. Therefore, this yet they manipulate the political process paper aims to discuss and compare how and the degree of political liberty and why undemocratic ways of shaping sufficiently to ensure that their basic hold voters’ behavior led to different election on power is not threatened.”9 Carothers’s outcomes in Russia 2000 and Ukraine argument corresponds to Andrew 2004. 5 Wilson, Virtual Politics. It is important to point out that in nascent 6 Ibid. democracies like Russia and Ukraine, it is 7 Ibid., p.273. 8 not only elections that primarily embody Michael McFaul, “Unfinished Business In the virtual nature of politics. The generally Europe,” The Washington Post, Washington: DC, September 22, 2002. democratic façade of these states’ politics 9 Thomas Carothers, "Western Civil Society Aid to has been reached by adopting institutional Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union," East European Constitutional Review 8, no. 3 (Fall 1999). 10 Wilson, 90. 67 forms of democracy, including regular totalitarian regime. This implies that, elections, and allowing a certain degree of unlike in Russia 2000, the political liberty.11 This façade according to undemocratically conducted but Carothers, has been “enough to gain democratically ended presidential international legitimacy and to relieve elections in Ukraine 2004 marked a domestic political pressure.”12 However, turning point in the latter country’s in practice these countries politics remain transition to democracy. conducted with the exercise of “informal mechanisms of control” over the state Candidates Chosen by Power Elite institutions.13 The first evidence of the undemocratic Given the rather artificial nature of treatment of the electorate in both Russian and Ukrainian politics in the countries was the attempts by the period in question, Mykola Ryabchuk incumbent presidents, Boris Yeltsin of chooses to avoid applying the term Russia and Leonid Kuchma of Ukraine, to “transition” when describing the shift promote and prioritise candidates they [the from the Soviet style totalitarian regime. incumbents] wanted to see as successors, To support his statement, the author openly disregarding democratic standards. argues that what had been happening in These candidates were Vladimir Putin in Russia and Ukraine prior

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