To survive, all forms of government require popular support, whether voluntary or involuntary. Following the collapse of the Soviet system, Russia's rulers took steps toward democracy, yet under ...Vladimir Putin Russia has become increasingly undemocratic. This book uses a unique source of evidence, eighteen surveys of Russian public opinion from the first month of the new regime in 1992 up to 2009, to track the changing views of Russians. Clearly presented and sophisticated figures and tables show how political support has increased because of a sense of resignation that is even stronger than the unstable benefits of exporting oil and gas. Whilst comparative analyses of surveys on other continents show that Russia's elite is not alone in being able to mobilize popular support for an undemocratic regime, Russia provides an outstanding caution that popular support can grow when governors reject democracy and create an undemocratic regime.
When the Soviet Union collapsed, most Russians had lived their entire lives in a quintessentially authoritarian culture. Having been socialized in this environment, how could citizens acquire the ...attitudes and behaviors necessary to support a new, more pluralistic regime? Cultural theories of political learning emphasize the primacy of childhood socialization and hold that altering initial attitudes is a decades-long process that depends on generational replacement. Institutional theories emphasize adult relearning in response to changing circumstances regardless of socialization. Lifetime learning integrates the competing perspectives. Multilevel models using New Russia Barometer data from 1992 to 2005 confirm the persistence of some generational differences in Russian political attitudes but demonstrate even larger effects resulting from adult relearning. Lifetime learning provides the most comprehensive account and suggests that Russians would quickly acquire the attitudes and behaviors appropriate to democracy-if Russian elites supply more authentic democratic institutions.
Russia Transformed Rose, Richard; Mishler, William; Munro, Neil
11/2006
eBook
Since the fall of communism Russia has undergone a treble transformation of its political, social and economic system. The government is an autocracy in which the Kremlin manages elections and ...administers the law to suit its own ends. It does not provide the democracy that most citizens desire. Given a contradiction between what Russians want and what they get, do they support their government and, if so, why? Using the New Russia Barometer - a unique set of public opinion surveys from 1992 to 2005 - this book shows that it is the passage of time that has been most important in developing support for the new regime. Although there remains great dissatisfaction with the regime's corruption, it has become accepted as a lesser evil to alternatives. The government appears stable today, but will be challenged by constitutional term limits forcing President Putin to leave office in 2008.
. The political support of citizens of new democracies reflects two sets of experiences. Initially, people are socialized into an undemocratic regime; then, they must re‐learn political support in ...relation to a new regime. In an established democracy, it is difficult to disentangle the effect of early socialization and current performance because both refer to the same regime. However, this is both possible and necessary in countries where there has been a change in regime. Critical questions then arise: When, whether and how do citizens determine their support for their new regime? At the start of a new regime past socialization should be more important but, after a few years, current performance should become more important. We draw on 47 Barometer surveys between 1991 and 1998 in ten more or less democratic post‐communist regimes of Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union to test the relative importance of early socialization influences, the legacy of the communist past, and the political and economic performance of new regimes. We find that economic and political performance explains the most variance in support and, secondarily, the communist legacy. Early socialization is insignificant. However, contrary to economic theories of voting, the impact of political performance is greater than the impact of economic performance in post‐communist countries – and its impact is increasing.
Democratic regimes depend for their survival and effective functioning on the public's willing acquiescence and support; however, the measurement of support is problematic. The failure to appreciate ...the difference between established democracies and new regimes that may (or may not) be in the process of democratizing has prompted scholars to mismeasure support by relying on idealist measures. We propose a realist conception of political support and realist measures. We test these measures with data from the 1995-97 World Values Surveys, comparing their ability to describe and explain variations in support for both old and new regimes. Realist measures perform substantially better in all contexts and in ways that suggest the rationality of realist support. /// Pour leur survie comme pour leur fonctionnement effectif, les régimes démocratiques ont besoin de l'accord tacite et du soutien des citoyens. Mais comment mesurer ce soutien? Ne pas tenir compte, comme cela est fréquent, de la différence entre régimes établis et nouveaux régimes (que ces derniers soient ou non en voie de démocratisation) mène à l'utilisation de mesures idéales de la démocratie. Les auteurs proposent, à l'inverse, de privilégier des mesures réalistes, et, à partir des données des World Values Surveys de 1995-97, montrent que leurs mesures donnent, du point de vue de l'analyse, les résultats les plus satisfaisants.
Public support for Presidents Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin has fluctuated significantly over Russia's first post-Soviet decade. Cultural explanations for these dynamics emphasize the country's ...authoritarian culture and Russian preferences for strong and decisive leaders. Neo-institutional theories attribute the dynamics to citizens’ everyday evaluations of presidential performance as the government succeeds or fails in meeting citizens’ needs and demands. This article tests competing cultural and neo-institutional theories of presidential popularity in Russia during the Yeltsin and early Putin years (1991–2000). We develop and estimate a series of political support models of Russian presidential approval. Although we find substantial support for elements of both cultural and neo-institutional theories of presidential popularity, institutional theories perform substantially better in accounting for fluctuations in Yeltsin's and Putin's popularity.
Popular trust in political institutions is vital to democracy, but in post-Communist countries, popular distrust for institutions is widespread, and prospects for generating increased political trust ...are uncertain given disagreements over its origins. Cultural theories emphasizing exogenous determinants of trust compete with institutional theories emphasizing endogenous influences, and both can be further differentiated into micro and macro variants. Competing hypotheses drawn from these theories are tested using data from 10 post-Communist countries in Eastern and Central Europe and the former Soviet Union. Aggregate data on economic and political performance are combined with survey data on interpersonal and political trust, political socialization experiences, and individual evaluations of national performance. Results strongly support the superiority of institutional explanations of the origins of political trust, especially micro-level explanations, while providing little support for either micro-cultural or macro-cultural explanations. This encourages cautious optimism about the potential for nurturing popular trust in new democratic institutions.
Trust in political institutions and in other people is hypothesized by cultural theories to be essential for making democracieswork. Trust is equated with diffuse support and linked to the stability ...and effective functioning of democratic regimes. Institutional theories, in contrast, question the importance of trust for democratic support and emphasize institutional performance instead. A structural equation model using New Russia Barometer survey data tests cultural and institutional theories of regime support. The results confirm cultural arguments that institutional trust encourages political involvement and contributes to public support for democratic ideals, whereas they contradict the hypothesis that trust is critical for political support. Much stronger support exists for institutional theory’s claims about the importance of economic and political performance. Cultural influences, however, appear somewhat larger than institutional theories allow and may become larger still during the longer term, suggesting the need to integrate cultural and institutional theories.
Was the 2007 Russian Duma election fair? International observers have agreed that it was unfair. Survey data from the 2007 Russian Duma election finds that most Russians disagree with international ...observers and they also disagree among themselves about the fairness of the Duma ballot. This article tests hypotheses about popular response to that election, accounting for differences in opinion, partisanship, the performance of the government, and individual socio-economic characteristics. The extent to which those who saw the election as unfair are less likely to support the political regime is also tested. The conclusion considers conditions in which perceptions of an unfair election can encourage positive change in a regime or the strengthening of authoritarianism.
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