Interim Report Component #2
Activity Report
Project Title:
How electoral systems affect democratic
accountability in Russian regions
Aitalina Azarova
Central European University
International Policy Fellowship
Budapest, Hungary
2004
During the first part of the IPF project (March-July 2004), all the activities
outlined in the project schedule were started, namely, field research, creation
of the questionnaire, and approbation of the questionnaire on a smaller sample
of selected public officials and experts. Research paper, as a part of the
Interim Report Package, was written and presented to different audiences.
In addition, according to expert’s suggestions, some rescheduling of the
activities took place.
Following tasks were accomplished:
1. Field research
The analysis of the current situation in the field of electoral rules and
practises in different regions, and indicating of the possible electoral
instruments aimed at the enhancing of accountability of the regional governments
included:
1. research into the official documents on regional elections, using Internet
resources, and sources available in the State Library in Moscow.
2. consultations with specialists in Russian electoral systems, including
key figures in the field of Russian regional politics, Petrov Nikolay (Carnegie
Centre, Moscow) and Vladimir Gelman (European University, S-Petersburg).
3. extensive reading on different effects of the electoral systems, using
the same sources, as outlined in the first point
4. collection of the data for the construction of the variables necessary
for accomplishment of the statistical analysis. Data was acquired through
the contacts with responsible officials in following federal agencies: Central
Electoral Commission, State Statistical Commission
5. interviews with several officials and experts in individual regions, aimed
at the improvement of the content of the initial questionnaire. The approbation
of the questionnaire on a small sample helped me to avoid possible inaccuracy
in framing questions and proved to be a good strategy in developing a better
survey content.
As an outcome of this activity, firstly, I developed a questionnaire to be
distributed among representatives of a majority of the Russian regions, and
secondly, on the basis of the aims of the research and availability of the
data, I compiled the list of the data, that will be used as an input matrix
for the statistical analysis (see Appendix1)
2. Research paper
The first draft of the research paper was prepared and presented at the Political
Science Department of the Central European University. Several alterations
to the initial plan of the research were made after valuable comments made
by the professors Gabor Toka, Balazs Varadi, Zsolt Enyegi, Tamas Meszerics,
Lawrence LeDuc (University of Toronto, Canada) and others.
Secondly, the paper was presented at Twente University (Enschede, Holland)
within a framework of the Ninth Summer School in Local Government Studies
(5-16 July 2004), where it benefited from the discussions with professors
and participants. Especially valuable were comments made by Mike Goldsmith,
Professor of Government at the University of Salford, Henk van der Kolk,
Professor of Political Science in Twente University and a co-director of
the Dutch Parliamentary Election Study in 1998, and Professor Lawrence Rose,
Professor at the Department of Political Science in Oslo University.
3. Networks
During conducting the field work I established many important contacts, salient
for the quality of the research fulfilment and for the dissemination of the
expected results. Below is the list of several of them:
3.1. a cooperation is established with the Academy of State Administration
in Moscow, Russia, (Oksana Gaman, gaman@mail.ru), a leading research and
education institute, whose students represent the top and medium-level administrative
stuff of the regional governments. The agreement was achieved concerning
the possibility of the distribution of questionnaires and later, the policy
recommendations among the students of the Academy, who represent the body
of the main stakeholder of the project, namely regional governments.
3.2. talks were conducted with the Center for Local Democracy (CLD)
at the Faculty of Social Sciences at Erasmus University (Rotterdam, the Nethelands)
(Dr. Harry H.F.M. Daemen cld@fsw.eur.nl) on the issue of the exchange of
the information. The CLD conduct research in the fields of changing relations
between citizens and local government, and have collected valuable information
on the effects of electoral systems on the policy making in local governments.
3.3. a cooperation was established with the magazine On Elections,
edited and published by the Central Electoral Commission in Moscow ( Ismail
…, chief editor), and the agreement was achieved on the publication of the
interim and final outcomes of the IPF project. The particular value of the
magazine lies in the circulation principle: it is distributed to all the
regional and many local electoral commissions throughout the federation,
therefore represents an important channel for dissemination of the policy
proposals to the stakeholders of the project
4. Collection of the data for the statistical analysis
During the first period of the project I compiled the list of the data that
will be used as an input matrix for the further analysis. The data necessary
for the carrying out the statistical regression analysis is being collected
in a variety of ways. Firstly, I was able to find data on the web-sites of
the federal and regional agencies. Second, some data was found in a hard
format in publications (newspaper and journal articles, books, periodical
reports, bulletins, and other published materials). Third, some data was
acquired through personal networks in the form of Word files. And,
finally, some of the data is being calculated by myself, using aforementioned
data.
5. Publications
Though during the first part of the IPF project no publication was made,
I did the preliminary work for publication the outcomes of the research.
5. 1. Research paper is being prepared in a format suitable for publication
in Russian academic journal (Russian language, focus on scientific
outcomes of the research)
5.2. Policy paper, stressing the necessity of electoral changes alongside
the prescribed changes in the electoral formula, and outlining policy proposals
for achieving those changes, is being prepared
5.3. A shorter version of the research paper are uploaded in the web-site
of Center of Policy Studies, CEU, Budapest
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