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Fraudulent Elections, Political Protests, and Regime Transitions

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Fraudulent Elections, Political Protests, and Regime Transitions Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Political Science Dissertations Department of Political Science Fall 12-14-2011 Fraudulent Elections, Political Protests, and Regime Transitions Alla Manukyan Georgia State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/political_science_diss Part of the Political Science Commons Recommended Citation Manukyan, Alla, "Fraudulent Elections, Political Protests, and Regime Transitions." Dissertation, Georgia State University, 2011. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/political_science_diss/21 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Political Science at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Political Science Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. FRAUDULENT ELECTIONS, POLITICAL PROTESTS, AND REGIME TRANSITIONS by ALLA MANUKYAN Under the Direction of Jennifer L. McCoy ABSTRACT This research studies protests after fraudulent elections in a collective action framework, examining the impact of the potential cost, benefit and likelihood of success of protest on the occurrence and intensity of protests. Quantitative analysis of fraudulent elections in about 100 countries from 1990 to 2004 shows that the odds of protest after fraudulent elections are greater when the level of state repression is moderate with a possible backlash effect of high repression, when the opposition is united, and when international monitors denounce election results. The analysis only partially supports the benefit of protest argument. Also, the research uses case studies from Eurasia (Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, and Russia) and mini-case studies from Africa and Latin America to study in more detail the effects of the factors identified in the quantitative analysis and to identify overlooked but important explanatory factors using a set of extensive interviews conducted in the United States and during fieldwork in Armenia, Georgia, and Russia with politicians, domestic and international election monitors, and country experts. INDEX WORDS: Protest, Demonstrations, Elections, Election fraud, State repression, Opposition cohesion, International election monitors, Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Russia, Collective action, Cost of protest, Benefit of protest FRAUDULENT ELECTIONS, POLITICAL PROTESTS, AND REGIME TRANSITIONS by ALLA MANUKYAN A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University 2011 Copyright by Alla Manukyan 2011 FRAUDULENT ELECTIONS, POLITICAL PROTESTS, AND REGIME TRANSITIONS by ALLA MANUKYAN Committee Chair: Jennifer L. McCoy Committee: Carrie Manning Jelena Subotic Ryan Carlin Electronic Version Approved Office of Graduate Studies College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University November 2011 iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am deeply thankful to my great dissertation committee and incredible Chair for directing, advising, and correcting me throughout this journey towards completing my doctoral research, as well as for inspiring me in many more ways. I greatly appreciate the value added to my research by many in-person and phone interviews with international election monitors and experts from the Carter Center, Democracy International, International Foundation for Electoral Systems, International Republican Institute, and Organization of American States, country experts and professors from leading U.S. universities, as well as politicians, political analysts and election observers from Armenia, Belarus, Georgia and Russia. I thank Professor Judith Kelley at Duke University for sharing with her insight on the subject matter and generously granting early access for my research to selected data from the Project on International Election Monitoring datasets. I also thank Professor Nikolay Marinov at Yale University for kindly granting me early access to selected data from the National Elections Across Democracy and Autocracy dataset. My sincere gratitude and best wishes go to everyone in our prospering Department of Political Science at Georgia State University for their invaluable contribution to my intellectual and personal growth. Last but not least, my love goes to my family – in the United States and in Armenia – for they have been the best motivation and support team throughout my doctoral study and research at Georgia State University. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................... iv LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................................ vii LIST OF FIGURES ..................................................................................................................... viii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ........................................................................................................ ix CHAPTER ONE Introduction: Why Explain Political Protest after Fraudulent Elections? .......... 1 CHAPTER TWO Collective Action Theory of Political Protest .................................................. 11 2.1 What Explains Post-Election Protests? ............................................................................... 11 2.2 Refining the Collective Action Theory of Post-Election Protests ....................................... 25 CHAPTER THREE Quantitative Analysis of Post-Election Protests within Collective Action Framework .................................................................................................................................... 34 3.1 Framework of Analysis ....................................................................................................... 34 3.2 Findings ............................................................................................................................... 43 3.3 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................... 55 CHAPTER FOUR Post-election Protests in Eurasia – Belarus and Russia ................................ 67 4.1 Belarus ................................................................................................................................. 69 4.2 Russia .................................................................................................................................. 85 4.3 Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 103 CHAPTER FIVE Post-election Protests in Eurasia – Armenia and Georgia ............................ 104 5.1 Armenia ............................................................................................................................. 105 5.2 Georgia .............................................................................................................................. 117 vi 5.3 Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 130 CHAPTER SIX Post-Election Protests in Africa and Latin America ....................................... 137 6.1 Africa ................................................................................................................................. 138 6.2 Latin America .................................................................................................................... 158 6.3 Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 186 CHAPTER SEVEN Conclusion: The Implications of This Research and Thoughts for Future Research ...................................................................................................................................... 192 REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................... 202 APPENDIX ................................................................................................................................. 229 vii LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Opposition strategies of protest against authoritarian elections ....................................... 7 Table 2: Frequency distribution of post-election protests by international reports of fraud .......... 8 Table 3: Explaining protest after fraudulent elections .................................................................. 62 Table 4: Moderate repression and protest after fraudulent elections ............................................ 64 Table 5: Factor change in odds of protest ..................................................................................... 66 Table 6: Disputed national elections and post-election protests in Belarus, 2000-2010 .............. 84 Table 7: National elections in Russia, 1993-2008 ...................................................................... 102 Table 8: Disputed national elections and post-election protests in Armenia, 1995-2008 .......... 115 Table 9: Disputed national elections and post-election protests in Georgia, 1995-2008 ............ 129 Table 10: Summary of main arguments from the analysis of postcommunist elections ............ 136 Table 11: Protests after disputed elections in selected African and Latin American countries .. 184 Table 12: Summary
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