Federalism and Electoral Authoritarianism under Putin

Demokratizatsiya, Summer 2005 by Ross, Cameron

Political Asymmetry

Socioeconomic and constitutional asymmetry in turn generates political asymmetry. For example, rich "donor subjects" (regions that pay more taxes to the federal budget than they receive back) have been more successful in carving out higher levels of political autonomy than the impoverished "recipient regions," which depend on federal transfers from the center for their economic survival. Constitutional and political asymmetry led to the creation of highly diverse political regimes in regions during the Yeltsin era, ranging from partial democracies at one end of the political spectrum to electoral dictatorships at the other end.9

The "War of Constitutions" and the Development of Contract Federalism

During the period from October 1991 to October 1993, there was a fierce struggle for power between the Russian presidency and parliament. Taking advantage of this period of political turmoil, a number of republics were able to ratify radical confederalist constitutions, which granted themselves considerable powers of political and economic autonomy. As Umnova notes, at least four types of central-local relations were in operation during this period: "(1) international relations (between Chechnya and Russia); (2) confederative relations (between Russia and the republics of Tatarstan and Bashkortostan; (3) federative relations with elements of confederative and unitary systems (in almost all of the ethnic republics and the richer donor territorially based subjects); and (4) federative relations with elements of a unitary system (in the poor territorially based regions)."10

To bring a halt to the parade of sovereignties, the Yeltsin regime was forced to sign a Federation Treaty in March 1992 in which it conceded major powers to the ethnic republics. In the treaty, the republics were recognized as sovereign states with rights of secession and granted independent powers over taxation and ownership of their land and natural resources. In addition, the republics were to have their own "constitutions, legislation, elected legislative bodies (parliaments), supreme courts, and presidents."" In contrast, the territorially based regions were given none of the above rights and their chief executives (governors) were to be directly appointed by the president. The Federation Treaty was ratified by the Russian parliament in April 1992 and its text was directly incorporated into the Russian constitution (the 1978 RSFSR constitution).

Tatarstan and Chechnya both refused to sign the Federation Treaty, and in November 1992, Tatarstan adopted its own rival constitution, which declared that, "it was a sovereign state, and a subject of international law, associated with the Russian federation on the basis of a treaty and the mutual delegation of powers."12 Chechnya, which had declared its independence as early as November 1991, proclaimed that it was an independent sovereign state and a full and equal member of the world community of states.

The December 1993 Constitution