Regional Elections and Political Stability in Russia : E Pluribus Unum

TITLE : REGIONAL ELECTIONS AND POLITICAL STABILITY IN RUSSIA : E PLURIBUS UNUM AUTHOR : JEFFREY W . HAHN, Villanova University THE NATIONAL COUNCIL FO R EURASIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN RESEARC H TITLE VIII PROGRA M 1755 Massachusetts Avenue, N .W . Washington, D .C . 20036 LEGAL NOTICE The Government of the District of Columbia has certified an amendment of th e Articles of Incorporation of the National Council for Soviet and East Europea n Research changing the name of the Corporation to THE NATIONAL COUNCIL FO R EURASIANANDEAST EUROPEAN RESEARCH, effective on June 9, 1997. Grants , contracts and all other legal engagements of and with the Corporation made unde r its former name are unaffected and remain in force unless/until modified in writin g by the parties thereto . PROJECT INFORMATION : ' CONTRACTOR : Villanova Universit y PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR : Jeffrey W. Hah n COUNCIL CONTRACT NUMBER : 812-06 g DATE : September 25, 1997 COPYRIGHT INFORMATION Individual researchers retain the copyright on their work products derived from researc h funded by contract or grant from the National Council for Eurasian and East Europea n Research. However, the Council and the United States Government have the right t o duplicate and disseminate, in written and electronic form, this Report submitted to th e Council under this Contract or Grant, as follows : Such dissemination may be made by th e Council solely (a) for its own internal use, and (b) to the United States Government (1) fo r its own internal use ; (2) for further dissemination to domestic, international and foreign governments, entities and individuals to serve official United States Government purposes ; and (3) for dissemination in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act or other law or policy of the United States Government granting the public rights of access to document s held by the United States Government . Neither the Council, nor the United State s Government, nor any recipient of this Report by reason of such dissemination, may use this Report for commercial sale . The work leading to this report was supported in part by contract or grant funds provided by the National Council for Eurasian and East European Research, made available by the U. S. Department of State under Titl e VIII (the Soviet-Eastern European Research and Training Act of 1983, as amended) . The analysis and interpretations contained in the report are those of the author(s) . CONTENTS Executive Summary i I . The Problem 1 II Russian Regional Politics 1 III. The Regional Elections of 1996 : Who won? 3 IV. Alternative Futures : Federalism or Separatism? 5 V. Net Assessment : Cautious Optimism 8 VI. Implications for the United States 9 Appendix: Russian Regional Executives 1 0 Endnotes 15 EXECUTIVESUMMAR Y This paper addresses the question of the possible de-stabilization or eve n disintegration of the Russian Federation in the face of growing regional independence . In particular, it analyzes the election of chief executives in most of Russia's regions between 1 September 1996 and 20 June 1997 . Now that virtually all chief executives in Russia's region s owe their jobs to their constituents rather than to President Yeltsin as most did, to wha t extent will they assert regional and local interests at the expense of national ones? I n answering this question the paper begins by looking at the evolution of regional politics sinc e 1989 . Then it describes the political composition of regional chief executives, both those who won the recent elections and all current office holders . Pressures for regional independence are then discussed along with options available to the center to control it . The paper ends with the author's assessment of the implications of these developments for American polic y toward Russia . With respect to the political composition of the regional executives, the results of the elections for the Yeltsin administration are ambiguous : on the one hand, compared to the situation before September 1996, they have lost much of their control over regiona l executives ; on the other, they can still count on support from more than a third of them, a little more than their opposition . The rest of the seats are up for grabs . Two other point s seem appropriate regarding winners and losers . First, ideology doesn't appear to have bee n as important in these races as it was in the race for President a few months earlier; voter s chose pragmatically those who were seen as best able to deliver for their region . It is likely that the new executives will make deals for their regions regardless of ideology . The second point is that with few exceptions the elections were held on time, were held honestly, and th e results were accepted by the losers indicating progress in terms of basic democrati c procedures. Despite fears on the part of the Yeltsin administration that they will no longer be abl e to control what happens on the regions, there are a variety of mechanisms available to the m by which to do so . These include using municipal executives (mayors) as checks and balances on governors, playing off the divergent interests of different regions in the Federation Council, using the center's ability to cut favorable deals with those regional head s willing to cooperate, and distributing subsidies in such a way as to maximize influence . While disintegration of the Federation into regional components does not appear likely , clearly regional heads will have greater independence than before . While some wil l undoubtedly abuse their new authority, greater regional independence can also become th e basis for the emergence of a stable federal system in Russia . i REGIONAL ELECTIONS AND POLITICAL STABILITY IN RUSSIA : E PLURIBUS UNUM? ' by Jeffrey W . Hahn Political Science Department Villanova University I. The Problem Over the next decade, Russia will most likely continue to lurch forward towar d becoming something like a modern European nation-state with an increasingly stable quasi - market economy and democratic political institutions. There is no certainty about thi s optimistic prediction and there are a number of plausible "dark scenarios ." The achievement of an optimistic outcome will depend on how well Russia deals with the multiple domesti c dangers facing it . This paper deals with one of these : the possible disintegration of the Russian Federation in the face of growing regional independence .The resolution of thi s problem is intimately entwined with solving other problems including economic stabilization , democratic institutionalization, ethnic identity, and even foreign relations . Despite its apparent importance to so many aspects of Russian development, failure to achieve stable federalism is often neglected in considering how Russia might come apart at the seams . Thi s lack of attention is likely to change over the next decade . The election of chief executives i n most of Russia's regions starting in September 1996 may set in motion centrifuga l tendencies that could do just that . II. Russian Regional Politic s In assessing the national implications of these regional trends, it may be useful t o clarify what is at stake . What do we mean by regional politics? According to the Constitutio n adopted in December 1993 Russia is formally a federation comprising eighty-nine sub - national members (in Russian, sub'ekty) . Among these members are forty-nine province s (oblasts), twenty-one republics, ten national districts (autonomous okrugs), six territorie s (krais), two large cities (Moscow and St . Petersburg) and the Jewish Autonomous oblast . The term "regional" is most accurately used to refer to politics and government in the oblasts , krais and two largest cities of the Russian Federation (all of which have the administrativ e 1The author wishes to thank Marc Zlotnik for sharing data on regional executives many of whic h appear at one point or another in this paper . He would also like to commend the Kennan Institute and it s Director, Blair Ruble, for supporting the study of Russia's regions and for helping to publish the weekly , Russian Regional Report, together with the Institute of East West Studies. The RRR is indispensable to those of us interested in this important issue . 1 status of an oblast) . although it is commonly extended to cover the republics as well . The republics, as well as okrugs and the Jewish autonomous oblast, are defined with reference t o their ethnic composition and have special rights as a result . In this paper, the term regiona l politics is used broadly to refer to politics at levels of government below the national level . Until 1990 all the regions were governed by legislative councils known as soviets whose members were nominated by the Party and "elected" without opposition by a reporte d 99% of the electorate . The councils then elected, unanimously, an executive committe e which administered local affairs in accordance with central policies . The introduction o f competitive elections in March 1990 led to fundamental changes in the way regions wer e governed .2 In Moscow and Leningrad anti-establishment, reformist majorities were electe d over candidates endorsed by the regional Communist Party leadership . They also did well i n large cities . Elsewhere, however, and especially in rural areas, members of the old Part y elite did well . The result was that many new regional legislatures were controlled by force s hostile to Yeltsin and the reformists of the "democratic movement ." Nevertheless, in an effort to get the regions to support him in his struggle with Gorbachev, Yeltsin, in Augus t 1990, told the regional leaders to : "take as much sovereignty as you can stomach." After the USSR collapsed in December 1991, this injunction proved problematical . To counteract what he perceived as communist dominated regional legislatures, Yeltsin had called earleir i n 1991 for the institution of directly elected executives who could no longer be removed by th e legislative councils 3 .

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