Like Elections, like Primaries

by Andrei Buzin, PhD in Law, an expert in election law. From 1993 to 2001 he held office as the election commission member at all six levels in an advisory capacity. Since 1999 - the chairman of the Inter-regional non-governmental association of voters. Since 2013 - the co-chairman of the movement ‘Golos’ Board 

‘Golos’ has published a comprehensive report on the primaries (in US, as well as in Russia) concerning the observations related to the preparation and holding of the primary election. The report has attracted the non-state media interest, as it is the case with the ‘Golos’ reports advertised by the government ideologists on NTV. Respectively, I would like to express my point of view on some of the findings of this report.

I will start from afar. It is astonishing that in Russian language some words carry their opposite meaning. 25 years ago, when I held the office of chairman of the Parliamentary Commission for Trade (there was a time!) delving into the terminology, I found out that, for example, the words ‘trade discount’ means ‘trade margin’. In the soviet times, the same could be said about the word ‘election’: this event had nothing to do with the Russian word ‘choice’, as pointlessly there was only one option to choose from.

Even now the contemporary Russian political language vocabulary contains numerous words and their well-established translation into European languages does not correspond to the notion essence pertaining to a word. In Russia the word ‘election’ carries quite a different meaning than in the West, as it implicates verification of the citizens’ loyalty, rather than a choice between political positions. This discrepancy invokes persistent misunderstanding of Western commentators (and sometimes Russian media) of the phenomena that occur in our elections (for example, the Western political analysts often perceive the low turnout as an indicator of satisfactory life). In fact, in Russia the meaning of ‘primaries’, in my opinion, has nothing to do with the American ‘primaries’. Our ‘primaries’ implicate successfully employed means of political technology, campaign that is not prohibited by law (strictly speaking ‘political advertising’) run before the official start of election campaign. Of course, law amendments could induce the review of ‘primaries’, as ‘Golos’ cautiously proposed in its report. However, I would like to emphasize that we do not have a law on political advertising.

In the US, Primaries is a global poll of party supporters to identify the party leaders. Of course, it also pertains to the campaigning activities, but it is secondary issue. As for us, the ‘United Russia’ primaries reflect exactly the opposite: it serves a grand campaign and the identification of leaders remains in the background. The ‘Parnassus’ tried to run primaries similar to those in the US, but it failed due to some technical flaws.

None of the violations identified in the ‘Golos’ report is penalized under the election law just because it is applied to the period of the election campaign. All violations are related to the misuse of public resources (financial, material, personnel, information) in support of political campaign of the next party candidate (and by saying this I am not referring to the ‘United Russia’, but the state administration, the executive power in its various guises). In our primaries the state administration violates precisely the same rules as it violates in elections: it misuses the resources entrusted by the public for its own benefit.

Impelling parties to hold primaries is the same as making party members to line up. A political campaign is an internal party issue. The parties should run campaign at the expense of their SUPPORTERS rather than the supporters of other parties or the taxpayers. The law enforcement authorities (prosecutors, tax authorities) should monitor the process, since such campaign violates the current laws (misuse of funds, political engagement, where it is prohibited, violation of the Personal Data Act), if these authorities, as well as the ‘United Russia’, do not pertain to the power vertical.