How to ensure the presidential elections and the high turnout, and confident the result of Putin
Andrew Vinokurov
Sergey Guneev/RIA “news”the President of Russia Vladimir Putin before the ceremony of laying flowers to the monument to Kuzma Minin and Dmitry Pozharsky on red square
Early presidential elections can be expected, according to sources “Газеты.Ru” close to the Kremlin. They will be held in March 2018. If it were otherwise, the election work was conducted now. Main questions — what ideology will campaign for a “new Putin” and who will be his opponents.
Three sources close to the Kremlin, said “Газете.Ru” what to expect early presidential elections is not worth it. “Now all guided by March 2018. Any preparation for the campaign had not previously seen,” says one of them.
Sources claim that before this idea was really discussed in the President’s entourage. But in the end it was abandoned.
Early presidential elections began to discuss soon after the decision on the postponement of the Duma elections on an earlier date. The idea of elections to the state Duma of the seventh convocation was to be held in December this year. In the middle of 2015 suddenly appeared a proposal to move Federal campaign on Sept. To legitimize this procedure was even involved especially the constitutional court, which upheld the legality of the transfer.
Soon the leaders of Duma factions was followed by a bill, which successfully passed all the necessary procedures. Formally, the initiative came from deputies. But, according to the “Газеты.Ru” the main instigator of the postponement of the elections was really the Kremlin. In the most common version due to the transfer campaign in the summer, the authorities wanted to lower the turnout to increase the result of “United Russia”.
However, quietly discussed another version. Sources close to the Kremlin, in conversations with “Газетой.Ru” they said that the postponement of the Duma elections could be a break out just before transfer of the presidential campaign. Because legal reasoning could be similar, and even though Russia has no case law, the same constitutional court in its decisions is guided by their own earlier decisions.
The sides “Газеты.Ru” he referred to two aspects. First, the bad economic situation the sooner you will be able to campaign, the better, because the crisis will only deepen. Second, recalled the election of the President of the United States. The smaller the time interval between the elections there and our own, the less pressure can provide American leaders in government candidate.
In Russian conditions, unexpected decisions can be made at any time. However, while early elections to seriously discuss stopped.
But there are many other issues. The campaign even on formal grounds will be different from the previous one. If earlier it was held just a few months after the Duma elections (Parliament is elected in December and President in March next year), now between two Federal campaigns more impressive time period. And, as experts say, during this time, managers of the presidential campaign will have to do very much.
“Now pause running against the government. In the period between elections will be the accumulation of negative and weakening factors postkrymsky consolidation” — the analyst believes Abbas Gallyamov.
Agrees with him and the head of the Center for economic and political reforms (CEPR) Nikolai Mironov: “In 2012, a protest against parliamentary elections passed and the presidential campaign. Although it was successfully overcome, it was still a shock for the authorities.”
Immediately after the Duma elections as the first Deputy head of the presidential administration took Sergei Kiriyenko. The media have highlighted his meeting with the expert community, where, according to information from its participants, and raised issues of the presidential campaign, as well as risks and challenges of the current political and social situation.
The threat of a low turnout
The majority of respondents “Газетой.Ru” experts claim that the presidential election needs a good turnout.
Therefore, it becomes critically important part of election participants.
And here there is a fork in the road. On the one hand, to the confident victory of Putin best traditional opponents who were a party in this Duma campaign. But as it turned out, it is difficult to mobilize new voters, in addition to nuclear. Hence, the appearance may be in question. But the attraction of new members, can give the campaign an element of unpredictability.
Abbas Gallyamov recalls that in autumn 2011, Putin’s electoral rating was much lower than approval of his actions: “People are basically approved the President’s course, but was not going to vote for him, just because he wanted to see the head of state someone new.”
“On the one hand, it is impossible to generate yourself a competitor. Old will not collect voters. In fact, they can lead only to his nuclear electorate. And we get a low turnout and huge margin of Putin. This, too, is unacceptable,” — says Nikolay Mironov.
However, according to Galliamova, a conservative scenario in which the opponents of Putin are Zyuganov, Mironov, Yavlinsky, has its advantages. “The main problem of Putin is that he is too long in power. Meaningful claims to his policies from voters, there is just a latent desire to see in this post someone new. In the struggle with Putin, Mironov and Zhirinovsky’s desire to remain neaktualizovat”, — the expert explains.
But in the case that competitors will be representatives next generation of party leaders, the situation can become unpredictable.
Of course, the lack of new faces threatens to disappointment of the electorate and low turnout. “But the elections still, the most important thing is winning, everything else is secondary,” — said the analyst.
But political consultant Leonid Davydov sure that the update is necessary. And new faces have to say new words and to introduce new ideas, which is the main candidate can offer. And if people vote for the candidate, carrying these ideas, they can be further developed and more people had known support, to put in some important positions. It will give the results of the election of the additional weight, as it will show that the people who voted for another candidate was heard.
In the last presidential election unexpected opponent of Putin were made by the businessman Mikhail Prokhorov. Despite the landslide victory of the incumbent President, this gave rise to a voter’s a kind of intrigue.
The participation of Prokhorov in conjunction with the fact that the protests were seen and supported by the leaders of the systemic opposition, created a picture of what the election and the opposition was, and Putin.
“In the Kremlin could say that everything went democratic. Participated in the elections, all voices meant something. And with a decent turnout of 65% Putin won a good victory with a score of 63.6 per cent”, concludes Nikolay Mironov.
New Putin
The most interesting aspect is ideological.
On each campaign, according to Leonid Davydov, Vladimir Putin went with a new idea: “Putin each time was different, this was a success.”
To run a campaign in a vacuum, without a new agenda will not work. The political consultant says that in previous elections it was the famous may decrees. By March 2018, a subpoena may be, for example, the representation of the country a new Prime Minister or new government, or new tasks for old.
Abbas Gallyamov said that in order to minimize the influence of poor socio-economic situation in the course of the campaign, it is necessary to breed two stages. The first is to strengthen Russia’s position in the world, securing its sovereignty. Second — improving the lives of people. Elections should actually mark the beginning of the second stage.
“The campaign needs to sum up the first stage and announce the start of the second. They say, we again made Russia a world leader, now it’s time to focus on the development of economy and social sphere”, — the expert explains.
In this story the “impoverished population” could once again be hope for improvement. In addition, if the Kremlin will be able to impose on society the thesis of a new stage, it will help at least partially to satisfy the growing request for update.
“For the Kremlin the main thing — to find a reason as often as possible, screwing the word “new”. If you can’t say that about the President, it is necessary to use it in relation to his policies,” says Gallyamov.
According to the analyst, the Kremlin should give the voter the feeling that “there is a real choice”, but in the end the choice was in favor of Putin. Thus, ideally, the choice for voters should not be negative when everyone else is even worse. He should vote for Putin just because of relationship with his name of the perspective development of the country and improvement of life.
Now, agrees Nikolai Mironov, a sense of “ideological vacuum”, and how to fill it out — is unclear. The poverty of the population progresses, and in this situation, the two pillars on which everything rests, is a way of “external enemies” and the thesis that without Putin would be worse.
“Alternative ways not yet invented. The left is afraid because of the experience of the Soviet Union. The Democrats remember the 90s, and they can’t assure people that this will not happen again. The only model — statist. And it just exploits the Putin — said the expert. —
While in fact, is the formula “God suffered and to us ordered”.
However, this is not enough. With this approach, the President will not be able to become, in part, according to Mironov, claim, — a kind of unifier.
Audit resources
Leonid Davydov secretes another set of problems that are already in front of those who will be involved in the campaign of Vladimir Putin. First of all, it is necessary to conduct “audit” of sociological tools. “Sociology requires new players and professional discussion between them. In fact the FOM and VTSIOM use the same contractors in the regions with roughly the same methods,” explains the expert.
In his view, such a monopoly in this sphere leads to the fact that both show the same results, but their data are not confirmed or not contested by third parties. This leads to the fact that possible errors sociologists just don’t reveal, not to mention the correction of their instruments.
“Inventory” political technology tools also, according to Davydov, is required. Speaking about the Duma elections, the expert noted that Federal campaign was in fact conducted separately from the regional. On the presidential this should not happen. Davydov suggests that Kiriyenko understands this problem. He hopes that his meetings with experts intended to assess the available frames: “I would like to hope”.
