Political Science Quarterly
Volume 116 No. 1 (Spring 2001)

 

Transitional Citizens: Voters and What Influences Them in Russia
By Timothy J. Colton. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2000.
Reviewed by Anders Åslund

 

This neat volume is a thorough statistical analysis of Russian elections by one of the foremost professors of Russian politics. Timothy Colton of Harvard has penetrated into the parliamentary elections in December 1995 and the presidential elections in June-July 1996 in a multifaceted regression analysis. With its thematic approach, this book complements the chronological study, How Russia Votes, by Stephen White, Richard Rose, and Ian McAllister.

But Colton has probed deeper, with the assistance of a large survey and sophisticated statistical methods. His presentation of regression results is admirably clear. Judiciousness is his trademark, though the reader often wishes that he were more daring. No doubt, this is the best analysis of any Russian election to date. It is likely to set a pattern for electoral analysis of Russia and other postcommunist countries.

Few of Colton's conclusions are startling, but his quantification is illuminating, showing that Russian voting is a highly patterned and sensible behavior. The voters have clear views, which are more consistent than most commentators realize. After this book, nobody can argue that Russian voting is arbitrary.

Colton calls Russia a "protodemocracy," but he presents quite a healthy picture of democracy. "Voting is the consummate act of citizenship" (p. vii). Participation in elections has been quite high, and less than 10 percent of the population is politically totally inactive. Russian voters do not obey employers, which employers realize, so they do little to influence their employees. Voluntary associations are many, but not very strong, playing little role. Instead, the media, especially TV, help form people's understanding, but skeptical Russian viewers seek alternative information.

Russian voting reflects primarily partisanship and opinions about issues. Colton confirms that the presidential election in 1996 was a referendum on the political and economic system. Although Russian citizens thought little of Boris Yeltsin, they voted for him in support of democracy and market economy. Unlike opinions, charismatic personalities are of little consequence in Russian elections. Whereas parties remain weak, partisanship is much greater than generally understood.

One of Colton's strongest conclusions is that Russia is not much polarized in sociopolitical terms. Rural voters with less education and family income are somewhat more likely to vote Communist, but these factors make little difference, far less so than in Western Europe. Instead, age turns out to be the most decisive factor after personal opinions, with pensioners voting more Communist; and the next factor is living in the north. Colton considers the age divide as "transition-related," while he does not elaborate on the intriguing political north-south divide, with the north voting against Communists. Education and incomes matter, but surprisingly little. Gender, religious belief, and ethnicity are barely significant as influences. Selfish pocketbook concerns play virtually no role, but formal ideology is also weak. Despite a profound division over values, the lack of social and ethnic chasms is a reassuring feature of present Russia. This book reveals no dangerous political trap or abyss.

Colton prides himself on seeing Russian voting in a comparative framework, primarily drawing from U.S. studies of voting. This is useful, but unfortunately he makes few references to the experiences of other postcommunist countries, which are the obvious comparative standards. My other reproach is that his language is more cumbersome than necessary.

This admirable and well-structured study is likely to be the standard textbook on Russian elections until somebody incorporates the elections of 1999 and 2000 in a similar volume.

Anders Åslund
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace