Political Elites Russia 2013

This article was downloaded by: [Central U Library of Bucharest]On: 27 November 2013, At: 08:58Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registeredoffice: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK

Europe-Asia StudiesPublication details, including instructions for authors andsubscription information:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/ceas20

Electronic Resources and the Study ofPolitical Elites in RussiaBettina Renza & Jonathan Sullivanaa University of NottinghamPublished online: 12 Nov 2013.

To cite this article: Bettina Renz & Jonathan Sullivan (2013) Electronic Resources andthe Study of Political Elites in Russia, Europe-Asia Studies, 65:10, 1898-1911, DOI:10.1080/09668136.2013.848646

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2013.848646

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (theContent) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis,our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as tothe accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinionsand views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors,and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Contentshould not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sourcesof information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims,proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoeveror howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to orarising out of the use of the Content.

This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Anysubstantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing,systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms &Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions

EUROPE-ASIA STUDIES

Vol. 65, No. 10, December 2013, 18981911

Electronic Resources and the Study of

Political Elites in Russia

BETTINA RENZ & JONATHAN SULLIVAN

Abstract Developments in the information society in Russia have led to the creation of an abundance of online primary

texts by political actors and institutions. This article surveys a large selection of ofcial electronic texts with

the aim of encouraging more extensive use of online sources and easing researchers navigation of Russian

politicians use of the internet. While the authors do not claim that online data can replace the insights gained

from elite interviews, the article suggests that online texts could be used more extensively as a valuable

addition to existing methods applied to the study of Russian political elites.

AS SCHOLARS OF RUSSIA KNOW VERY WELL, ELITE POLITICS has traditionally been conducted in private and informal settings, and publically available information has not

been very useful in illuminating the important action going on behind the scenes. Given the

relative lack of reliable public data on Russian political elites, studies of political attitudes

and behaviour have tended to rely on interviews with protagonists or close observers. The

insights gained from interviews continue to be invaluable, especially when it comes to

examining complex situations in a political system where informal networks and practices

are at least as important as formal institutions (Whitmore 2010, p. 1000). Yet interviews can

also be costly, gaining access to key players is often problematic, and interview data are not

very amenable to shared use. The purpose of this article is to provide a survey of under

utilised electronic data and to introduce researchers to the potential of these resources as a

supplement to prevailing methods such as interviewing political elites. The abundance of

primary-source electronic texts, resulting from developments in the Russian information

society, and moves towards e-government, have created many opportunities to complement

and extend existing research on political elites. Just as our understanding of public attitudes

and political behaviour at the mass level in contemporary Russia has made signicant

advances due, in large part, to the availability of systematic survey data,1 we argue that

textual sources hold similar potential for analysts of elite political actors. The range of

For example, survey work by the Public Opinion Foundation (Fond obshchestvennoe mnenie), http:// corp.fom.ru, the Russian Public Opinion Research Centre (Vserossiiskii tsentr izucheniya obshchestvennogo mneniya), http://wciom.ru, and the Levada Centre, http://www.levada.ru, have facilitated much Russian and English-language academic research.

ISSN 0966-8136 print; ISSN 1465-3427 online/13/100189814 q 2013 University of Glasgow

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2013.848646

1

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3

ELECTRONIC RESOURCES AND THE STUDY OF POLITICAL ELITES 1899

online texts created by Russian political actors is greater than at any previous time. This

does not imply fully transparent governance, nor does it mean that types of political

behaviour previously conducted in informal venues are now openly visible online. However,

as political scientists in numerous contexts increasingly recognise (Sullivan & Veen 2009),

a legitimate method for studying elites is to analyse the texts that they produce. Political

texts are the concrete by-product of strategic political activity (Laver et al. 2003, p. 311),

and include all manner of spoken and written materials, from speeches, debates and

legislative addresses to electronic writings of various kinds, including blogs and tweets. As

an output of political activity, political texts are widely recognised as useful sources for

generating data on the behaviour, preferences and interactions of political actors (Slapin &

Proksch 2008).

In terms of the quantity and quality of electronic data sources, there has never been a more

fruitful time for conducting empirical research on Russian politics. Use of the internet in

Russia has grown rapidly over the past decade,2 and the development of the information

society was a central aspect in President Dmitrii Medvedevs modernisation campaign.

Both Medvedev and his predecessor and successor, Vladimir Putin, have expressed the

opinion that developing information technology was imperative for the countrys economic

competitiveness. Within this context, the nine-year Electronic Russia (Elektronnaya

Rossiya) programme was launched by the federal government in 2002, with the goal of

establishing an e-government infrastructure, providing internet services to citizens and

improving the transparency of state institutions (McHenry & Borisov 2006, pp. 106566).

As a result of this initiative, all Russian state structures from the federal level down to the

municipal level are now connected online, and have made a wealth of resources available to

citizens and researchers. Medvedev repeatedly called on politicians to commit to improving

the quality of information provided online, describing ofcials who treated websites as

merely decorative trimmings as unt to act in positions of responsibility (Medvedev

2009). The visibility and quality of online content quickly improved in reaction (Nocetti

2011, p. 9). The implementation of Electronic Russias goals has not been straightforward

and the achievements so far have not been without criticism. Bureaucratic obstacles and

resistance on the ground, as well as a lack of expertise, have meant that the quality and

quantity of online information made available by diverse state institutions continues to vary

dramatically (Baigarova 2010). However, Russian governmental websites look very much

like those in many other countries of the world and to dismiss them as a Potemkin Village,

erected to give the appearance of democracy, would be erroneous (McHenry & Borisov

2006, p. 1092). In some aspects of online communication, Russia compares favourably with

consolidated democracies. For instance, a recent study found that the percentage of Russian

regional governors maintaining a blog far exceeded that of their counterparts in Germany,

the UK, the US and Canada (Top 2012). Our analysis of 759 Russian politicians and

ofcials3 similarly reveals considerable engagement with new and social media platforms

(see Table 1). Although these practices are increasingly recognised as an important window

2While only 2% of the population were regular internet users in 2000, this proportion increased to over 40% by 2010, available at: http://www.internetworldstats.com/euro/ru.htm, accessed 2 July 2011.

3Namely, 34 ofcials employed in the Ofce of the President or Kremlin (including the President), 26 ofcials in the ofce of the Prime Minister (including the Prime Minister), the 83 regional governors, 166 Senators in the Federation Council or upper house, and 450 deputies in the State Duma or lower house.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3

1900 BETTINA RENZ AND JONATHAN SULLIVAN

TABLE 1 RUSSIAN OFFICIALS ONLINE MEDIA BY INSTITUTION (% TOTAL MEMBERSHIP)

Institution Homepage Blog Facebook Twitter Live journal N

Kremlin 5.8 5.8 2.9 26.5 20.6 34 Prime minister 0 7.7 3.8 30.8 7.7 26 Governors 37.4 42.2 1.2 38.6 20.5 83 Upper House 9.6 1.8 0 3.6 0.6 166 Lower House 26.7 4.7 0.7 9.3 6.7 450

Source: Authors; as of September 2011.

onto Russian political communications, there has been very little research into the subject to

date (Top 2012).

Given the scale of the online ecology in Russia, we do not provide an exhaustive survey of

all the electronic resources available and extensive interpretation of online materials and

their potential effects is beyond the scope of the article. However, in providing some

signposts for Russia scholars and to indicate, where appropriate, how similar material has

been utilised for research in different contexts, we hope to stimulate further interest in

electronic data created by political actors and what these can add to the study of elite politics

in Russia. The article will focus on a number of major political institutions in Russia

starting with a survey of online sources and texts pertaining to the executive organs of power

(Ofce of the President, the prime minister and government ministries), the online archives

of the legislature (State Duma and Federation Council) and the resources relating to regional

politics.

The executive

The Ofce of the President

Given the centrality of the presidency in contemporary Russia, much deliberation on elite

politics has understandably focused on this actor and institution. Scholars have focused

especially on the impact of the powerful executive on the ability of other political

institutions to inuence the course of politics in contemporary Russia, that is, on the

consequences of super-presidentialism on the prospects for democracy (Fish 2000;

Ishiyama & Kennedy 2001). As a result, many studies aimed at providing macro-level

conceptualisations, focusing on questions such as how do we sum up the Russian regime

under Putin and Medvedev? or what kind of politicians are Putin or Medvedev? (Bacon &

Renz 2006). That the super-presidential system contributed much to Russias failure in

fullling early post-Soviet era expectations of making a successful transition to a liberal

democratic regime is largely accepted. However, analysts have also pointed to the often

contradictory nature of the Russian leadership and regime, which displays features that are

both reformist and reactionary (Sakwa 2008, p. 879). The quest for conceptualisations of

contemporary Russia is essential for our understanding of the political system and regime,

but it has meant that addressing questions on a lower order that could help explain such

contradictions (such as those regarding policy content and the reasons for policy decisions

made by the president in specic circumstances) have sometimes been neglected. We do not

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


question the necessity of looking at the bigger picture, but we suggest that systematic

empirical research into the presidents (and other Russian politicians) rhetoric could

enhance our understanding of the regime and its policies and, ultimately, feed back into

macro-level explanations.

Although analysts largely agree that informal practices and procedures are important for

understanding contemporary Russian politics (Ledeneva 2006), there is a perception that

public pronouncements and speech acts do also matter. Much attention is paid, as a rule, to

the Russian presidents annual state of the nation address (Urban & Khestanov 2011), as

well as to key texts created by incumbents, such as Putins autobiographical First Person

(Ot pervogo litsa) (2000) and Medvedevs Go Russia! (Rossiya vpered!) manifesto.4

Scholars have utilised the study of presidential discourse and narratives in various ways in

order to draw out motivations, worldview and inconsistencies with the aim of providing

explanatory, critical and predictive insights into [the] polity (Bacon 2012, p. 769). Yet,

despite this interest, there has been little effort, for example, to study Russian presidents

political pronouncements over time, perhaps because of the perceived lack of data and,

possibly, lack of awareness of the tools required to analyse them. The Kremlin website

provides many valuable resources, including a database of speeches.5 The Kremlin website

is also one of the few cited in this article that provides professional English translations for

almost all of the documents published.6 The searchable database covering Medvedevs time

in ofce holds close to 6,000 texts, many of which are verbatim transcripts of speeches and

other public performances, interviews and press conferences.7 Medvedevs major speeches

and public appearances are also accessible in the form of more than 600 audio les and 700

video les accessible for download on the website.8 Since August 2009, videos have been

posted on the Kremlins ofcial You Tube channel which, according to statistics provided by

You Tube, has attracted a respectable audience.9 More than 18,000 documents are also

stored in a searchable archive covering both of Putins presidential terms back to 1999.10

The presidential database is updated daily and offers a virtually unbroken record of

presidential pronouncements for more than a decade. The Kremlin websites advanced

search function allows researchers to search not only the collection of transcripts and

speeches, but also the catalogue of all ofcial documents signed by the president (such as

federal laws and presidential decrees) and the catalogue of telegrams sent.11 The

comprehensive collection of resources housed by the presidential website was in part driven

by the centrality of information technology in Medvedevs modernisation drive.

Furthermore, Medvedev certainly practised what he preached. The Kremlin website linked

4Medvedevs Go Russia! manifesto on his visions for the countrys political and economic development was rst published on the liberal newspaper Gazetas website in September 2009. The full text is available at: http://eng.kremlin.ru/news/298, accessed 2 July 2011.

5www.kremlin.ru, accessed 18 May 2012. 6http://eng.kremlin.ru/, accessed 18 May 2012. 7http://kremlin.ru/search, accessed 18 May 2012. 8http://kremlin.ru/audio; http://kremlin.ru/video, accessed 18 May 2012. 9http://www.youtube.ru/user/kremlin, accessed 18 May 2012. 10http://archive.kremlin.ru/, accessed 18 May 2012. 11http://oldsearch.kremlin.ru/kremlin_ru/, accessed 18 May 2012. Elsewhere, similar online archives have

been used, for example, to study the policy position of the President of the Republic of China, Chen Shui-bian. Analysing more than 2,000 of his speeches with the help of computer-assisted content analysis the research assessed his position on Taiwanese independence over time and uncovered ndings that signicantly challenged previous studies on the same subject (Sullivan & Lowe 2010).

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


to a Twitter account covering ofcial Kremlin news (@KremlinRussia_E) and Medvedevs

own Twitter feed (@MedvedevRussiaE), which recorded his activities in a direct and

personal style. Both feeds averaged daily activity and by July 2013 had around 110,000 and

650,000 followers, respectively. Medvedev also maintained a video blog from October

2008, whose entries were published both on the Kremlin website and on the Livejournal

platform.12 By July 2013 the blog contained 378 entries and was followed by more than 16,000 readers. In the short video entries recorded specically for the blog, Medvedev expressed his views on subjects as diverse as nuclear safety, foreign direct investment and alcoholism amongst children. Readers were encouraged to comment on the blog posts and some entries on Livejournal attracted approaching 1,000 comments.13

A nal presidential resource worth noting is the State tab on the Kremlin website.14

Here readers can nd links to information about lesser known (and lesser researched)

institutions working in support of the executive, such as the Presidential Administration, the

State Council, the Security Council, presidential commissions and presidential councils.

Information on the tasks, working schedule, composition and membership (including short

biographies), as well as a news section, is available for each institution. The State Council

also provides transcripts of meetings with links to additional documents and material.15

From the 13 presidential commissions and 12 presidential councils in June 2011, the

Commission for Economic Modernisation and Technological Development understandably

had the biggest internet presence. The Commission maintains its own ofcial website where

a multitude of information is made available, including full transcripts and video recordings

of the Commissions meetings.16

The Prime Ministers Ofce and Government

With the exception of Evgenii Primakov, who was already well known for his foreign policy

thinking when he became prime minister for an eight month term in September 1998

(Pushkov 1998), the political views of Russian prime ministers have not really been the

subject of academic enquiry. Throughout much of the post-Soviet era prime ministers have

taken a subordinate position in the system of executive authority (White 2011). Although

the parliament has made use of its constitutional powers to inuence presidential decisions

on government formation in some instances, the tenure of prime ministers tended to be cut

short if the post-holder emerged as a potential rival to the president (Morgan-Jones &

Schleiter 2004; Shevchenko 2005). The political standing of the prime minister changed

dramatically when Putin was appointed to the post following the end of his second

presidential term in 2008. President Medvedev wielded substantial constitutional powers,

including the right to dismiss the prime minister (although such a scenario was unthinkable).

However, the political capital Putin brought to his new position meant that the country came

to be governed to some degree like a parliamentary republic, a development that Richard

12http://kremlin.ru/video/blog; http://blog-medvedev.livejournal.com/, accessed 24 July 2013. 13For a more detailed analysis of Medvedevs video blog, see Top (2012). 14http://state.kremlin.ru/, accessed 18 May 2012. 15http://state.kremlin.ru/state_council, accessed 18 May 2012. 16http://www.i-russia.ru/sessions/reports/; http://www.i-russia.ru/sessions/sessions_video, accessed 18

May 2012. Whilst full transcripts were available for all 25 meetings of the Commission by July 2011, the video recordings in some instances only show Medvedevs opening and/or closing remarks.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


Sakwa calls a para-constitutional innovation (2008, p. 890). Although many observers

initially expected Medvedev to act as little more than a puppet for the Putin regime, the new

power constellation became known as the tandem, where both actors wielded considerable

power (Ryabov 2008; Hale & Colton 2010).

With Putins re-election as president the importance of the post of prime minister as an

institution has arguably decreased and could diminish further if Medvedev is replaced with a

lesser-known candidate in the future. In the meantime, however, systematic studies of the

prime ministers political pronouncements have the potential to shed light on important

questions such as the continuity of his views, the extent of cooperation or disagreement

between president and prime minister, and the future potential, if any, of the tandem. For a

study of Putins political utterances over time the Kremlin website archive provides access

to speeches and performances up until 2008. The site for materials from 2008 to 2012 is the

ofcial website of the prime ministers ofce and the website of the Russian government.17

Information available on these sites is not comparable to the wealth of materials available on

the Kremlin website. They are more difcult to navigate and links to social media sites are

conspicuously absent by comparison. However, the events section on the prime ministers

ofce website allows readers to access information on the prime ministers activities,

including transcripts of speeches and records of meetings with government ministers.18

These materials are updated and arranged on a day-by-day basis, and are navigable via a

calendar function. Although Putin did not maintain a video blog, Twitter feed or the

like, a points of view section gave thematic access to his position as prime minister on

key questions ranging from the countrys historical legacy to international relations.19

An advanced search function eases the collection of systematic sets, for example, of prime

ministerial speeches and texts on specic issues.20

The ofcial government website (a separate portal from the prime ministers website)

includes a searchable database of almost 5,000 documents signed by the government since

2008.21 The entire document collection can also be accessed in chronological order.22 The

sites personalities section provides useful information (date of tenure, governmental

responsibilities, biographical data) for all 26 members and ministers in the Russian

government. A chronicle (khronika) for each government ofcial gives direct access to

documents relating to them, including transcripts of government meetings in which they

spoke. The entries for Russias 17 federal ministers link to the websites of the respective

ministries that they lead.23 While all federal ministries, including federal services and

agencies concerned with national security, have maintained websites for several years (Renz

2005), we have observed substantial improvements in recent times. Within the framework of

federal programmes to develop e-government and the information society, considerable

resources have been allocated to ministries to develop new websites and to exploit the

internet more effectively (Susarov 2010). While previous versions of the websites, for

example, of the Ministry of Defence and the Federal Security Service (FSB), used to contain

17http://premier.gov.ru/; http://government.ru/, accessed 10 July 2011. 18http://premier.gov.ru/events/, accessed 10 July 2011. 19http://premier.gov.ru/points/, accessed 10 July 2011. 20http://premier.gov.ru/search/, accessed 10 July 2011. 21http://government.ru/documents/, accessed 10 July 2011. 22http://government.ru/gov/, accessed 11 July 2011. 23http://government.ru/gov/, accessed 11 July 2011.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


little up-to-date or systematic information, recent investments have resulted in professional

looking user friendly portals with fairly comprehensive resources.

The website Ofcial Russia (Otsialnaya Rossiya) is particularly useful as a portal for

easy access to the ofcial servers of central state institutions and ministries.24 Its section on

federal executive authorities presents a straightforward list of more than 50 internet

addresses for all federal ministries, services and agencies, including that of the FSB and

even such obscure security agencies as the Main Directorate for Special Programmes under

the President (GUSP).25 While the design features and scale of available materials varies, all

of these websites have a minimal offering of a search function, a database of laws and

documents regulating their activities, information on structure and leadership, and a news

section with a collection of interviews and/or speeches by ofcial representatives of the

institution. A number of ministries and other state agencies even make use of social media

sites and provide links to their ofcial pages on Facebook (Ministry for Agriculture;

Ministry for Natural Resources and the Environment), the Russian social networking site

VKontakte (Ministry of the Interior), Twitter feeds (Ministry for Emergency Situations

MChS, Ministry for Education and Science; Ministry of Finance) and blogs (Director of the

Federal Control of the Drug Trade).

The legislature and Federal Assembly

The State Duma

There is substantial interest in comparative studies of legislative behaviour focusing on the

political preferences and subsequent behaviour of legislators. Since the rst parliamentary

elections in post-Soviet Russia in 1993, legislative behaviour within the Russian context has

also been studied widely. As the Assemblys chamber that is directly elected and also the

site of party political activities,26 scholars have focused predominantly on legislative

behaviour in the State Duma. The Russian parliament has been a relatively marginal actor in

the policy process vis-a`-vis the executive, and increasingly so since the further centralisation

and personalisation of power over the past decade. However, if we are to understand the

limits and costs of presidential control over the political sphere, the study of such institutions

is important for a nuanced understanding of how the Russian state works (Whitmore 2010,

pp. 10008). Moreover, although executive-sponsored legislation usually passes smoothly,

this is not always the case (Remington 2008, p. 979). Due to the availability of roll-call

voting data for Duma deputies, Russia scholars, like their counterparts in the US and

Europe, have generally tended to focus on voting behaviour, rather than legislative

speeches, as a way of analysing political behaviour and ideological preferences (Haspel

1998; Shevchenko & Golosov 2001; Chaisty 2007; Remington 2008; Thames 2010).

In order to capture the inuence of informal practices on the policy process in contemporary

Russia, moreover, some researchers have used in-depth interviewing as a means to study

the behaviour and attitudes of legislators (Ostrow 1996, 1998; Whitmore 2010). Some

24http://gov.ru/, accessed 24 July 2013. 25http://gov.ru/main/ministry/isp-vlast44.html, accessed 11 July 2011. 26The second chamber of Russias Federal Assemblythe Federation Councilwas directly elected only

in 1993. Subsequently its members have been selected by different means. Party factionalism in the Federation Council is not permitted.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


transcripts of Russian parliamentary sessions have been used in prior qualitative-based

estimates of the political preferences of parliamentarians (Morgan-Jones & Schleiter 2004;

Shevel 2011), and there is much scope for using this resource more extensively. But there

are also, as yet, unexplored opportunities for quantitative textual studies.27

The State Dumas website is regularly updated and features multiple searchable databases

and is a useful source of information on the legislative process and legislative behaviour.28 It

provides a database of statistics relating to the legislative process, the texts of parliamentary

inquiries, and a searchable database of draft bills.29 Information is provided for more

than 25,000 laws and other acts adopted by the Federal Assembly dating back to 1994.30

Of particular interest is the database of transcripts, which provides comprehensive access to

the full, verbatim reports of all plenary sessions dating back to 1994.31 An advanced search

function permits researchers to rene their search of transcripts with a wide combination of

terms and parameters.32 The systematic analysis of these rich textual sources has the

potential to deliver reliable data, for example, on political preferences, issue salience, and

measures of cooperation and conict in political interaction in the Russian legislature.

As argued elsewhere within the context of the EU Council this could usefully supplement

previous work based on voting data and interviews (Sullivan & Selck 2007).

Information on the Dumas 450 deputies can be accessed in alphabetical order, and

arranged by political faction and committee.33 Entries for each deputy provide biographical

information, committee membership and links to a list of laws they initiated as well as to

transcripts of parliamentary sessions in which they spoke. If a deputy maintains a personal

homepage, links to this are also provided. The same set of materials can be accessed for

deputies of previous Duma convocations dating back to 1994, via the websites history

tab.34 In addition to information published on the Dumas ofcial website, numerous

legislators use social media tools, prompting interesting areas of enquiry and an additional

source of data. In December 2010 the Russian broadsheet Vedomosti published a list of

Duma deputies (and other state ofcials) blogs, microblogs and social network accounts

with direct links to the respective sources.35 The effects these methods of communication

may be having on representativeconstituent relationships in Russia and elsewhere are far

from clear and are not the focus of this article. However, we should not underestimate their

value. Elsewhere, researchers have found that legislators are using Web 2.0 tools to address

substantive political issues and, regardless of brevity, should be treated as seriously as more

27Elsewhere, researchers have successfully conducted systematic analyses of similar texts with the help of computer-assisted content analysis. Using software packages such as Wordscores or Wordsh, for example, policy positions of parliamentarians have been reliably identied in the contexts of the EU, the US and Germany (Benoit et al. 2005; McGuire & Vanberg 2005; Slapin & Proksch 2008; Proksch & Slapin 2009). As these techniques are non-language specic, similar systematic analyses of textual sources studies could be conducted in the Russian context.

28http://www.duma.gov.ru/, accessed 11 July 2011. 29http://www.duma.gov.ru/legislative/statistics/; http://www.duma.gov.ru/representative/interpellations/;

http://www.duma.gov.ru/systems/law/, accessed 11 July 2011. 30http://duma.consultant.ru/, accessed 11 July 2011. 31http://transcript.duma.gov.ru/, accessed 11 July 2011. 32http://www.cir.ru/duma/, accessed 11 July 2011. 33http://www.duma.gov.ru/structure/deputies/; http://www.duma.gov.ru/structure/factions/; http://www.

duma.gov.ru/structure/committees/, accessed 11 July 2011. 34http://www.duma.gov.ru/about/history/, accessed 11 July 2011. 35http://www.vedomosti.ru/special/deputies-communications.shtml, accessed 24 July 2013.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


formal expressions (Sullivan 2010; Sullivan & Cheon 2011). Until recently our primary

access to the thoughts of Duma deputies was from journalists reports, mediated sound-bites

or our own occasional interviews. Today, new means of communication allow us to access

an almost continuous stream of thoughts, comments, musings and reections.

The Federation Council

The Federation Council is Russias second chamber of parliament, where 166 senators

represent Russias 83 federal subjects. The 1993 Constitution gave the Federation Council

signicant powers, as it can consider and reject legislation approved by the State Duma and

has to approve decisions on war and peace. Unlike the State Duma, the upper chamber

cannot be dissolved by the President. Given the constitutional importance of its tasks, the

Federation Council has attracted surprisingly little academic attention as a political

institution and site for studying legislative behaviour. This is partially due to the fact that

compared to the State Duma it is relatively closed to outsiders (for example, voting data for

individual senators are rarely made public). Moreover, following changes to the selection

process of senators in 2000, the Federation Council is generally seen to have lost much of its

independence as an actor in policy making with its voting majorities heavily shaped by the

presidential administration. Having said this, while it is true that the Federation Council

today approves legislation supported by the government most of the time, there are also

exceptions. So far, there has been little more than speculation about the reasons for these

rejections and there seems to be ample scope for more detailed studies of senators political

behaviour and preferences (Remington 2003, p. 669). In May 2011 President Medvedev

hinted at the possibility of a future return to a directly elected upper chamber.36 Any move

towards making the Federation Council more accountable will certainly reinvigorate

interest in the institution in the future.

Although information provided on the Federation Councils website is less extensive than

that offered by the State Duma it nonetheless makes available a wealth of materials for

studying the political beliefs and preferences of its senators in quite some depth.37 As there

is no comprehensive information on votes cast by individual senators, analyses of voting

behaviour have not been an option for researchers interested in the upper chamber.

As mentioned above, however, in other contexts written and spoken texts have been

treated as data to study political preferences. As is the case with the State Duma,

parliamentary speeches appear to remain an under-utilised resource in the case of the

Russian Federation Council as well. Its website links to a comprehensive database of

Federation Council sessions dating back to 1994.38 A wealth of material can be downloaded

for almost 300 such sessions. Crucially, there are full transcripts (many of these are up to

several hundred pages in length) and, from 1999 onwards, video recordings of each session.

The website also stores the full, verbatim reports of parliamentary hearings since 2004,

which can be downloaded as word documents.39 There are about 25 of these hearings per

year and the detailed transcripts are up to 100 pages long.

36Medvedev Does Not Rule Out Emergence of Other System of Forming FC, Itar-Tass news agency, 18 May 2011, available at: http://www.itar-tass.com/en/c152/145016.pdf, accessed 2 July 2011.

37http://www.council.gov.ru, accessed 11 July 2011. 38http://www.council.gov.ru/lawmaking/sf/index.html, accessed 11 July 2011. 39http://www.council.gov.ru/events/parliament/index.html, accessed 11 July 2011.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


The website gives access to the archives of the Federation Councils Russian-language

publications, Parlamentskoe obozrenie and Vestnik Soveta Federatsii, both from 2005.40

Analiticheskii vestnik, downloadable back to 1994, is another rich resource containing

interviews, transcripts of speeches and articles by individual senators.41 Each bulletin

focuses on a specic topic of interest to the Russian Federation, ranging from cyber

terrorism to the environment. Entries for individual senators can be accessed either

alphabetically or by region, for biographical data, committee membership and contact

information.42 An advanced search function enables searches of specic sections of content,

allowing researchers, for example, to search for individual senators contributions to

parliamentary sessions and hearings.43

Politics in Russias regions

Due to the size of the Russian Federation and the vast number of its administrative units and

subdivisions, we can only provide a glimpse of the wealth of electronic resources available

to researchers interested in political behaviour at the regional and local level. Russias 83

federal subjects are divided into 521 city units and 1,790 municipal units. At the lowest

administrative level these units are split further into 1,733 city districts and 19,585 rural

districts (Ross 2010, p. 167). Since the rise of Putin to political prominence, the nature of

centreregional relations in Russia has changed signicantly. During the Yeltsin era these

relations were characterised by an asymmetry that allowed inuential regional governors

and those in charge of wealthy federation subjects in particular, to negotiate a higher level of

autonomy on a bilateral basis. As a part of his drive to strengthen the power vertical, Putin

sought to scale back regional autonomy and the inuence of powerful governors when he

was elected president in 2000. Institutional changes included abolishing governors ex

ofcio representation in the Federation Council and reverting to a system of appointment,

rather than popular election of governors (Blakkisrud 2011, p. 367).44 The division of

Russian territory into seven large administrative districts headed by envoys appointed by the

president was another reform aimed at reasserting central control (Petrov 2002).

There is little doubt that the Kremlins control over the regions has been tightened over

the last decade. However, it is clear that there are limits to this recentralisation of power and

concluding that the centre established complete control over the regions would be an

oversimplication (Chebankova 2005). Some scholars have even argued that attempts to

impose central dominance over the regions resulted in the opposite effect: the

marginalisation of regional political forces that had established themselves over the past

two decades has caused opposition and even open conict with the centre in some cases

(Moses 2010; Petrov 2010). In spite of the growing dominance of the pro-Kremlin

United Russia Party in elections at the federal level, it has not been as successful in

extending its authority in the regions (Reuter 2010; Slider 2010). While the future direction

40http://www.council.gov.ru/inf_ps/parlisurvey/index.html; http://council.gov.ru/publications_sf/ publisher1/index.html, accessed 11 July 2011.

41http://www.council.gov.ru/inf_sl/bulletin/index.html, accessed 11 July 2011. 42http://www.council.gov.ru/staff/members/index.html, accessed 11 July 2011. 43http://www.council.gov.ru/search/index.html, accessed 11 July 2011. 44Regional governors were appointed by the president from 1991 to 1996. They were elected from 1996 to

2003 and the system of appointments was reintroduced in 2004.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


of centreregional relations in Russia is difcult to predict, it is clear that developments at

the regional and local levels will continue to inuence Russian politics at the federal level.

Thanks to prior research conducted on regional politics we know much about local elections

and the background of governors, including their relationship with the ruling regime.

Regional public attitudes and political behaviour on the individual level have also been

studied (Konitzer 2006; Moses 2008; Golosov 2011). Probably due to the practicalities of

collecting appropriate data, the political pronouncements and preferences of governors have

rarely been studied in comparative perspective. It is good news for researchers then, that

regional institutions today maintain a multitude of resources on their websites, providing the

opportunity for cross-regional studies.

The Federation Councils website serves as a comprehensive portal to a wealth of

electronic resources relating to Russias 83 regions. Federation subjects can be accessed in

alphabetical order to view basic information on each regions administration and legislature,

with links to their ofcial websites. From here, there are links to the websites of

administrative subdivisions down to the district level.45 As can be expected, the quality and

quantity of the information varies considerably, with governors and local executives sites

tending to be more extensive and professional than those of local legislatures.

At the top end of the scale of quality and quantity are the ofcial websites of the Moscow

city government and Duma.46 The Moscow city government provides a searchable database

of over 20,000 ofcial documents, including mayoral decrees, resolutions and agreements

dating back to 1996.47 The mayors page includes a list of his interviews and the press

service offers a variety of verbatim reports, including transcripts of government meetings.48

The website links to the ofcial sites of Moscows ten administrative districts which, in turn,

link to the websites of the city boroughs they oversee (125 boroughs in total).49 An

unfortunate drawback of the Moscow governments site is the fact that a new version was

created with the arrival of the current mayor of Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin, in October 2010.

Although there is a link to the website of his predecessor, Yurii Luzhkov, we encountered

numerous technical difculties accessing Luzhkovs online archives.50 The Moscow City

Dumas website, in addition to information on deputies and political factions, has several

searchable databases, such as legal acts adopted dating back to 1994, statements back to

1996, and transcripts of parliamentary sessions back to 2000.51 The websites of other

regional executives and legislatures are often less comprehensive but they do, as a rule,

provide lists of speeches and interviews by governors and links to the archives of local

newspapers and publications.

All presidential envoys in Russias seven federal districts maintain websites that can be

accessed via the Otsialnaya Rossiya (Ofcial Russia) portal.52 While the information on

these sites is patchy, they provide background information on the presidential envoys and

45http://www.council.gov.ru/subject_RF/sub/index.html, accessed 11 July 2011. 46http://www.mos.ru; http://www.duma.mos.ru/, accessed 11 July 2011. 47http://www.mos.ru/documents/, accessed 11 July 2011. 48http://www.mos.ru/authority/mayor/; http://www.mos.ru/press-center/transcripts/, accessed 11 July

2011. 49http://www.mos.ru/authority/structure/, accessed 11 July 2011. 50http://old.mos.ru/, accessed 11 July 2011. 51http://www.duma.mos.ru/zakon.shtml; http://www.duma.mos.ru/stn.shtml, accessed 11 July 2011. 52http://www.gov.ru/main/page3.html, accessed 24 July 2013.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


their activities, including a collection of speeches and interviews. In some cases, such as the

Siberian Federal District and the Volga Federal District, minutes of the meetings of district

councils (these include the governors of federation subjects located in the district) are also

available for download.53 As is the case at the federal level, the use of social media by

political elites is a growing phenomenon in regional politics. Although Russian governors

are no longer elected and therefore not subject to the pressure of seeking competitive

advantages through their communications with voters, recent research found that 35%

maintained a blog (Top 2012) (see also Table 1 above). According to the internet portal

goslyudi.ru, which publishes a regularly updated list of blogs maintained by Russian

politicians and public gures, at least 38 mayors and heads of local municipalities were

blogging by July 2011.54 Presidential envoys in federal districts appear to be the least active

in this eld with only Igor Kholmanskikh (@polpred2012), envoy to the Urals

Administrative District, and Viktor Ishaev (@news_ishaev), in the Far Eastern

Administrative District, maintaining active Twitter accounts by July 2013.

Conclusion

Research on public attitudes and voting behaviour has beneted enormously from open

scholarly access to systematically collected, reliable data. Research on elite political

behaviour in Russia could similarly benet from supplementary datasets generated by

analysing some of the abundant electronic primary sources now available. The large variety

of online sources and texts created by political institutions and actors at all levels of ofce

has opened the possibility, for example, of studying the political pronouncements and

ideological positions of politicians over time and across regions, as well as the opportunity

of studying political actors who have not previously been the subject of detailed academic

enquiry. The emergence of elitemass communications via the internet naturally prompts

many important research questions relating to the restructuring of information ows and

power relations. Although it is outside the scope of this article to address these questions, we

hope to have demonstrated that there is abundant primary source information available

online for students of different aspects of elite politics in Russia. Many of the online

resources discussed above, such as speeches, transcripts and blogs, can be utilised as an

additional source for qualitative studies of elite politics, for quantitative content-analytical

studies, or, with additional processing, automated text analysis. While online electronic

resources will not, and should not, replace the insights derived from prevailing interview-

based methods, they are a useful addition to the toolbox for researchers seeking to gain a

nuanced understanding of Russian politics in all its complexity.

University of Nottingham

References

Alexanyan, K. (2009) The RuNetLost in Transition, Russian Analytical Digest, 69, available at: http://

www.res.ethz.ch/analysis/rad/, accessed 2 July 2011.

Bacon, E. (2012) Public Political Narratives: Developing a Neglected Source through the Exploratory Case

of Russia in the PutinMedvedev Era, Political Studies, 60, 4.

53http://www.sibfo.ru/institutes/sovet/protocol.php; http://pfo.ru/?id8127, accessed 11 July 2011. 54http://goslyudi.ru/competence/munmanagement/, accessed 2 July 2011.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


Bacon, E., Renz, B. & Cooper, J. (2006) Securitising Russia: The Domestic Politics of Putin (Manchester, Manchester University Press).

Baigarova, P. (2010) Electronic Russia: Reality or Empty Promises?, Digital Icons: Studies in Russian, Eurasian and Central European New Media, 1, 3.

Benoit, K., Laver, M., Arnold, C., Pennings, P. & Hosli, M. (2005) Measuring National Delegate Positions at the Convention on the Future of Europe Using Computerized Word Scoring, European Union Politics, 6, 3.

Blakkisrud, H. (2011) Medvedevs New Governors, Europe-Asia Studies, 63, 3. Chaisty, P. (2007) The Inuence of Sectoral and Regional Economic Interests on Russian Legislative

Behaviour, Post-Soviet Affairs, 23, 4. Chebankova, E. (2005) The Limitations of Central Authority in the Regions and the Implications for the

Evolution of Russias Federal System, Europe-Asia Studies, 57, 7. Fish, S. (2000) The Executive Deception: Superpresidentialism and the Degradation of Russian Politics, in

Sperling, V. (ed.) Building the Russian State: Institutional Crisis and the Quest for Democratic Governance (Boulder, CO, Westview Press).

Golosov, G. (2011) Russias Regional Legislative Elections, 20032007: Authoritarianism Incorporated, Europe-Asia Studies, 63, 3.

Hale, H. & Colton, T. (2010) Russians and the PutinMedvedev Tandemocracy: A Survey-based Portrait of the 20072008 Election Season, Problems of Post-Communism, 57, 2.

Haspel, M. (1998) Should Party in Parliament be Weak or Strong? The Rules Debate in the Russian State Duma, Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics, 14, 1.

Ishiyama, J. & Kennedy, R. (2001) Superpresidentialism and Political Party Development in Russia, Ukraine, Armenia and Kyrgyzstan, Europe-Asia Studies, 53, 8.

Konitzer, A. (2006) Voting for Russias Governors: Regional Elections and Accountability under Yeltsin and Putin (Washington, DC, The Johns Hopkins University Press).

Laver, M., Benoit, K. & Garry, J. (2003) Extracting Policy Positions from Political Texts using Words as Data, American Political Science Review, 97, 2.

Ledeneva, A. (2006) How Russia Really Works: The Informal Practices that Shaped Post-Soviet Politics and Business (Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press).

McGuire, K. & Vanberg, G. (2005) Mapping the Policies of the US Supreme Court: Data, Opinion and Constitutional Law, American Political Science Association, Washington, DC, 15 September, available at: http://www.unc.edu/,kmcguire/papers/McGuire_and_Vanberg_2005_APSA_Paper.pdf, accessed 24 July 2013.

McHenry, W. & Borisov, A. (2006) E-government and Democracy in Russia, Communications of the Association of Information Systems, 17, 1.

Medvedev, D. (2009) Speech at the Joint Session of the State Council and the Council for the Development of the Information Society, 23 December, available at: http://archive.kremlin.ru/eng/text/speeches/ 2009/12/23/1916_type82913_223512.shtml, accessed 2 July 2011.

Morgan-Jones, E. & Schleiter, P. (2004) Governmental Change in a PresidentParliamentary Regime: The Case of Russia 19942003, Post-Soviet Affairs, 20, 2.

Moses, J. (2008) Who Has Led Russia: Russian Regional Political Elites, 19542006, Europe-Asia Studies, 60, 1.

Moses, J. (2010) Russian Local Politics in the PutinMedvedev Era, Europe-Asia Studies, 62, 9. Nocetti, J. (2011) Digital Kremlin: Power and the Internet in Russia, Russia/NIS Centre Paris, Russie.Nei.

Visions no. 59, p. 9, available at: http://www.ifri.org/downloads/ifrinocettirussianwebengmars2011.pdf, accessed 3 September 2012.

Ostrow, J. (1996) Institutional Design and Legislative Conict: The Russian Supreme SovietA Well-Oiled Machine and Out of Control, Communist and Post-Communist Studies, 29, 4.

Ostrow, O. (1998) Procedural Breakdown and Deadlock in the Russian State Duma: The Problems of an Un-Linked Dual-Channel Institutional Design, Europe-Asia Studies, 50, 5.

Petrov, N. (2002) Seven Faces of Putins Russia: Federal Districts as the New Level of State-Territorial Composition, Security Dialogue, 33, 1.

Petrov, N. (2010) Regional Governors Under the Dual Power of Medvedev and Putin, Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics, 26, 2.

Proksch, S. & Slapin, J. (2009) Position Taking in European Parliament Speeches, British Journal of Political Science, 40, 3.

Pushkov, A. (1998) The Primakov Doctrine and a New European Order, International Affairs, 44, 2. Putin, V. (2000) First Person: An Astonishingly Frank Self-Portrait by Russias President (London, Random

House). Remington, T. (2003) Majorities Without Mandates: The Russian Federation Council since 2000, Europe-

Asia Studies, 55, 3.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3


Remington, T. (2008) Patronage and the Party of Power: PresidentParliament Relations under President Putin, Europe-Asia Studies, 60, 6.

Renz, B. (2005) Russias Force Structures and the Study of CivilMilitary Relations, Slavic Military Studies, 18, 4.

Reuter, O. (2010) The Politics of Dominant Party Formation: United Russia and Russias Governors, Europe-Asia Studies, 62, 2.

Ross, C. (2010) Federalism and Inter-Governmental Relations in Russia, Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics, 26, 2.

Ryabov, A. (2008) Tandemocracy in Todays Russia, Russian Analytical Digest, 49, available at: www.res. ethz.ch/analysis/rad/, accessed 2 July 2011.

Sakwa, R. (2008) Putins Leadership: Character and Consequences, Europe-Asia Studies, 60, 6. Shevchenko, I. (2005) Easy ComeEasy Go: Ministerial Turnover in Russia, 19902004, Europe-Asia

Studies, 57, 3. Shevchenko, I. & Golosov, G. (2001) Legislative Activism of Russian Duma Deputies, 19961999,

Europe-Asia Studies, 53, 2. Shevel, O. (2011) Nation-Building from Yeltsin to Medvedev: Ethnic, Civic or Purposefully Ambiguous,

Europe-Asia Studies, 63, 2. Slapin, J. & Proksch, S. (2008) A Scaling Model for Estimating Time Series Policy Positions from Texts,

American Journal of Political Science, 52, 3. Slider, D. (2010) How United is United Russia? Regional Sources of Intra-Party Conict, Journal of

Communist Studies and Transition Politics, 26, 2. Sullivan, J. (2010) Legislators Blogs in Taiwan, Parliamentary Affairs, 63, 3. Sullivan, J. & Cheon, S. (2011) Reconnecting Representatives in Two East Asian Democracies, East Asia:

An International Quarterly, 28, 1. Sullivan, J. & Lowe, W. (2010) Chen Shui-bian: On Independence, The China Quarterly, 203. Sullivan, J. & Renz, B. (2010) Chinese Migration: Still the Major Focus of Russian Far East/Chinese

Northeast Relations?, The Pacic Review, 23, 2. Sullivan, J. & Selck, T. (2007) Political Preferences, Revealed Positions and Strategic Votes: Explaining

Decision-Making in the EU Council, Journal of European Public Policy, 14, 7. Sullivan, J. & Veen, T. (2009) The Council of Ministers: Shedding Light on an Opaque Institution,

Government and Opposition, 44, 1. Susarov, A. (2010) Pautina vlasti: sozdanie saitov stanovitsya odnim is lyubimykh zanyatii gosstruktur,

Vremya novostei, 10 August, available at: http://www.vremya.ru/2010/141/4/259513.html, accessed 2 July 2011.

Thames, F. (2010) The Effect of Governor Support on Legislative Behaviour in the Russian Duma, Europe-Asia Studies, 62, 1.

Top, F. (2012) Blogging for the Sake of the President: The Online Diaries of Russian Governors, Europe-Asia Studies, 64, 8.

Urban, M. & Khestanov, R. (2011) The Signicance of a Non-Event: Dmitrii Medvedevs 2010 Presidential Address to Parliament, The Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics, 27, 2.

White, S. (2011) Understanding Russian Politics (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press). Whitmore, S. (2010) Parliamentary Oversight in Putins Neo-Patrimonial State: Watchdogs or Show-

Dogs?, Europe-Asia Studies, 62, 6.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [C

entra

l U L

ibrary

of B

ucha

rest]

at 08

:58 27

Nov

embe

r 201

3

AbstractThe executiveThe Office of the PresidentThe Prime Minister's Office and Government

The legislature and Federal AssemblyThe State DumaThe Federation Council

Politics in Russia's regionsConclusionReferences

Documents

Political Elites Russia 2013