Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-28T00:54:50.373Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Preference for Presidentialism: Postcommunist Regime Change in Russia and the NIS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2011

Gerald M. Easter
Gerald M. Easter
Affiliation:
Miami University
Get access

Abstract

The recent wave of democratic transitions has stimulated scholarly interest in a previously undeveloped area of study: comparative presidentialism. Comparative presidentialism seeks to define variant types of presidentialism that have emerged from transition processes, to identify the conditions that shape institutional choice and to understand more clearly the causal relationship between institutional choice and democratic regime outcomes. Using the postcommunist transitions, this paper contributes to the emerging comparative presidentialism literature by suggesting a revision to the argument that presidentialism leads to failed democratic transitions. The paper focuses attention away from the institutional rules of the game and toward the actors who actually make the institutional choice. Three postcommunist cases, distinguished by their different regime outcomes, are compared: Russia, Uzbekistan, and Estonia.

Type
Research Article
Information
World Politics , Volume 49 , Issue 2 , January 1997 , pp. 184 - 211
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1997

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 See O’Donnell, G., Schmitter, P., and Whitehead, L., eds., Transition from Authoritarian Rule: Prospects for Democracy, 4 vols. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986–88)Google Scholar; especially, vol. 3, Comparative Perspectives, and vol. 4, Tentative Conclusions about Uncertain Democracies.

2 See, e.g., DiPalma, G., To Craft Democracy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990); T. Vanhanen, The Process of Democratization: A Comparative Study of 147 States (New York: Crane Russak, 1990)Google Scholar; Przeworski, A., Democracy and the Market: Political and Economic Reforms in Eastern Europe and Latin America (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Huntington, S., The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1991)Google Scholar; Bermeo, N., ed., Liberalization and Democratization: Change in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992)Google Scholar. See also the. Journal of Democracy, devoted exclusively to the study of worldwide processes of democratization, which was first published in 1990.

3 See Higley, J. and Gunther, R., eds., Elites and Democratic Consolidation in Latin America and Southern Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992)Google Scholar; and, Mainwaring, S., O’Donnell, G., and Valenzuela, S., eds., Issues in Democratic Consolidation (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1992)Google Scholar.

4 Higley and Gunther (fn. 3), 3.

5 “The Perils of Presidentialism,” Journal of Domocracy 1 (Winter 1990)Google Scholar. An expanded version of this argument is found in “Presidential or Parliamentary Democracy: Does It Make a Difference?” in Linz, J. and Valenzuela, A., eds., The Failure of Presidential Democracy: Comparative Perspectives (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994)Google Scholar.

6 Mainwaring, S., “Presidentialism, Multipartism and Democracy: The Difficult Combination,” Comparative Political Studies 26, no. 2 (July 1993)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Stepan, A. and Skach, C., “Constitutional Frameworks and Democratic Consolidation: Parliamentarianism and Presidentialism,” World Politics 46 (October 1993)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Valenzuela, A., “Latin America: Presidentialism in Crisis,” Journal of Democracy 4 (October 1993)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; O’Donnell, G., “Delegative Democracy,” Journal of Democracy 5 (January 1994)Google Scholar; and, Riggs, F., “Conceptual Homogenization of a Heterogeneous Field: Presidentialism in Comparative Perspective,” in Dogan, M. and Kazancigil, A., eds., Comparing Nations (Oxford: Blackwell, 1994)Google Scholar.

7 Horowitz, D., “Comparing Democratic Systems,” Journal of Democracy 1 (Fall 1990)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

8 Shugart, M. and Carey, J., Presidents and Assemblies: Constitutional Design and Electoral Dynamics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), chap. 3CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Shugart and Carey make a case in favor of a modified form of presidentialism, “premier presidentialism,” which is similar to Duverger’s “semi-presidential” type found in France and Austria. See Duverger, M., “A New Political System Model: Semi-Presidential Government,” European Journal of Political Research 8, no. 2 (1980)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. A similar argument is made in Sartori, G., Comparative Constitutional Engineering (New York: New York University Press, 1994), chap. 7Google Scholar.

9 The better-known examples include: Lipset, S. M., “Some Social Requisites of Democracy,” American Political Science Review 53, no. 1 (1959)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Almond, G. and Verba, S., The Civic Culture (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and, Moore, B., Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy (Boston: Beacon Press, 1966)Google Scholar.

10 Lipset, S. M., “The Centrality of Political Culture,” Journal of Democracy 1 (Fall 1990)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 Putnam, R., Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993)Google Scholar.

12 See J. Linz and A. Valenzuela (fn. 5), ix–xii.

13 The observation that elite structures influence regime transitions has been made previously. See Huntington, S., “How Countries Democratize,” Political Science Quarterly 106 (Winter 1991—92)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Higley, J. and Burton, M., “The Elite Variable in Democratic Transitions and Breakdowns,” American Sociological Review 54 (February 1989)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and, Stepan, A., “Paths toward Redemocratization: Theoretical and Comparative Considerations,” in O’Donnell, G. et al. , Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Comparative Perspectives (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986)Google Scholar.

14 These three elite structures correspond roughly with Scott Mainwaring’s typology of regime transitions: a dispersed structure results from “transition through regime defeat,” a reformed structure results from “transition through extrication,” and a consolidated structure results from “transition by transaction.” The chief difference with Mainwaring’s typology arises in the cases of a consolidated elite structure, where the costs of staying in power decreased and the transitions fell far short of consolidated democracies. Mainwaring, “Transitions to Democracy and Democratic Consolidation: Theoretical and Comparative Issues,” in Mainwaring et al. (fn. 3), 322—25.

15 Institutional choice is determined by employing Shugart and Carey’s two defining criteria: (1) the government’s survival is more dependent on the president or parliament; and, (2) the president or the parliament is the principal authority over the government. The two criteria are measured as a continuum ranging from “maximum” to “none.” A mixed system exists if neither the president nor parliament is able to dominate both criteria. Shugart and Carey (fn. 8), 26.

16 Przeworski(fn.2),81.

17 Gorbachev’s approach, however, did not quite fit the Spanish or Brazilian versions of “pacta transition” or “transition by transaction.” In these cases, regime leaders engaged preexisting and organized sociopolitical groups in a gradual process of negotiation and compromise. See Share, D., “Transitions to Democracy and Transition through Transaction,” Comparative Political Studies 19 (January 1987)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. By contrast, Soviet leaders attempted to give form and content to a within-system reform campaign that unintentionally gave rise to radicalized movement politics. See Fish, M. S., Democracy from Scratch (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993)Google Scholar.

18 Smyth, R., “Ideological vs. Regional Cleavages: Do Radicals Control the RSFSR Parliament?” Journal of Soviet Nationalities 4, no. 3 (1991)Google Scholar.

19 Slider, D., “Political Elites and Politics in the Republics,” in Lane, D., ed., Russia in Flux (Hants, England: Edward Elgar, 1992), 49Google Scholar.

20 The position of republican presidency was created by Gorbachev in the Soviet center as an enticement to increasingly independent-minded bosses from the republican parties to support his political reforms. Kuznetsov, Y., “The Making of a President,” Demokratizatsya 2 (Spring 1994), 223Google Scholar.

21 Izvestiia, March 26, 1991, p. 2.

22 Komsomol’skaia pravda, June 14, 1991, p. 1.

23 Rossiiskaia gazeta, November 3, 1991, p. 1.

24 Przeworski (fn. 2), 67–69.

25 Thorsen, C., “Russia’s Draft Constitution,” RFE/RL, December 3,1993Google Scholar.

26 Izvestiia, April 27, 1993, pp. 1, 2.

27 Rossiiskaiagazeta, April 28, 1993, p. 1.

28 Rossiiskaia gazeta, June 6, 1993, p. 1.

29 Rossiiskaia gazeta. May 26, 1993, p. 1; May, 27, 1993, p. 1; June 19, 1993, p. 1.

30 Segodnia, July 13, 1993, p. 2.

31 Rossiiskie vesti, July 20, 1993, p. 1.

32 Izvestiia, September 22, 1993, p. 1.

33 According to Yeltsin’s own account, military leaders at first refused to carry out his orders to take the parliament building by force. Yeltsin, , The Struggle for Russia (New York: Times Books, 1994), chap. 1Google Scholar.

34 Komsomol’skaia pravda, November 10, 1993, p. 1. Sergei Filatov, then head of the president’s staff, authored most of the revisions strengthening the presidency. Moskovskie novosti, October 31, 1993, pp. A8, A9; Izvestiia, October 26, 1993, p. 5.

35 The referendum required a minimum 50 percent approval from a minimum 50 percent of the electorate for ratification. The official figures listed 54.8 percent of the electorate participating, with 58.4 percent voting in favor of the new constitution. Rossiiskaia gazeta, December 25, 1993, p. 1. It was later suggested that the turnout figures were inflated to assure the ratification of the constitution. Izvestiia, May 4, 1994, p. 1.

36 The impeachment process requires: (1) one-third of the lower house voting to charge the president with treason or serious criminal conduct; (2) a Constitutional Court ruling on the procedural correctness of the lower house’s action; (3) a Supreme Court ruling on the substance of the lower house’s charge; (4) an additional ruling on the substance of the charge by a special commission of lower house members; (5) two-thirds of the lower house voting in favor of impeachment; and (6) two-thirds of the upper house voting in favor of impeachment. If this process is not concluded within three months, the charge against the president is automatically dropped.

37 An excellent investigation into the presidential administrative apparatus is found in Huskey, E., “The State-Legal Administration and the Politics of Redundancy,” Post-Soviet Affairs 11 (April-June 1995)Google Scholar.

38 See Yeltsin’s two presidential decrees on local government, Rossiiskaia gazeta, October 12, 1993, and December 25, 1993.

39 See the interview with Anatolii Tiazhlov, chair of the Union of Governors, in Rossiiskaia gazeta, August 16, 1995, pp. 1, 2.

40 ibid.

41 Tatarstan was the first region to sign a special treaty with the president and the central government in February 1994. As of March 1996, eleven additional regions had negotiated similar ad hoc treaties. Nezavisimaia gazeta, February 25, 1994, p. 1.

42 Izvestiia, November 28, 1991, p. 1.

43 A. Rahr, “KGB Survives under Yeltsin’s Wing,” RFE-RL, March 27,1992, p. 2Google Scholar.

44 See the interview with then Defense Minister Grachev, Krasnaia zvezda, June 9, 1992, pp. 1, 2.

45 Hanson, P., “The Industrialists and Russian Economic Reform,” RFE-RL, May 18,1992Google Scholar.

46 Slider, D., “Privatization in Russia’s Regions,” Post-Soviet Affairs 10, no. 4 (1994)Google Scholar; Linz, S., “The Privatization of Russian Industry,” RFE-RL, March 11, 1994Google Scholar; McFaul, M., “State Power, Institutional Change, and the Politics of Privatization”, World Politics 47 (January 1995), 210–43CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

47 Rossiiskaia gazeta, January 10, 1992, p. 1.

48 Hanson (fn. 45), 1–7; Komsomol’s kaia pravda, April 9, 1994, p. 1; Izvestiia, February 13, 1996, p. 1.

49 Komsomol’skaia pravda, February 14, 1990, p. 1.

50 See, for example, the charter of the Birlik movement published in Furtado, C. and Chandler, A., eds., Perestroika in the Soviet Republics: Documents on the National Question (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1992), 517–19Google Scholar.

51 Carlisle, D., “Uzbekistan and the Uzbeks,” Problems of Communism 40 (September-October 1991), 30Google Scholar; and, Allworth, E., The Modern Uzbeks (Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 1990), 293–95, 325–29Google Scholar.

52 Pmvda, February 16, 1990, p. 1.

53 Ibid.

54 Slider (fn. 19), 49.

55 See interview with Karimov in Sel’skaia zhizri, December 21, 1991, p. 2.

56 FBIS: Soviet Union, March 28, 1990.

57 Pravda vostoka, December 30, 1991, p. 1.

58 FBIS: Central Eurasia, September 28, 1992.

59 Pravda vostoka, December 9, 1992, p. 1.

60 Ibid., May 14, 1993, p. 33.

61 The Fatherland Progressive Party is headed by one of the president’s counselors. Segodnia, December 14, 1993, p. 5.

62 FSIS: Central Eurasia, June 17, 1995.

63 Rossiiskaia gazeta, June 18, 1995, p. 6.

64 Pravda vostoka, February 25, 1995, p. 1.

65 FBIS: Central Eurasia, March 31, 1995.

66 The division of state spoils at the local level has in some places led to clan-based conflicts. Rossiiskaia gazeta, April 30, 1993, p. 6.

67 Tokogozoglu, Y., “Uzbek Government Continues to Stifle Dissent,” RFE-RL: Research Report, no. 39 (October 1,1993)Google Scholar.

68 Narodnoe slovo, March 25, 1995, p. 2.

69 Nezavisimaia gazeta, January 15, 1993, p. 2.

70 FBIS: Central Eurasia, February 4, 1992.

71 Ibid., January 9, 1992.

72 Ibid., March 6, 1992.

73 Narodnoe slovo, April 16, 1993, p. 1.

74 FBIS: Central Eurasia, July 26, 1993.

75 Ibid., January 30, 1992; January 31, 1992.

76 Ibid., February 25, 1992; May 28, 1993.

77 Krasnaia zvezda, May 20, 1993, p. 2.

78 Officials of Russia’s State Property Committee, in fact, helped to organize and train employees in Uzbekistan’s State Property Committee. Narodnoe slovo, September 27, 1994, p. 1.

79 See remarks of privatization head, Viktor Chzhen, Pravda vostoka, August 8, 1995, p. 2.

80 FBIS: Centra/Eurasia, May 5, 1992; May 7, 1992; December 30, 1992.

81 Narodnoe slovo, January 6, 1995, p. 2; FBIS: Central Eurasia, May 17, 1995.

82 Misiunas, and Taagepera, R., The Baltic States: Years of Dependence, 1940–1990, rev. ed. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), chap. 7Google Scholar.

83 FBIS: Soviet Union, March 21, 1990.

84 Izvestiia, March 27, 1990, p. 2.

85 FBIS: Soviet Union, March 12, 1991.

86 Taagepera, R., “Estonia’s Constitutional Assembly, 1991–1992,” Journal of Baltic Studies 25, no. 3 (Fall 1994)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

87 Ibid., 217.

88 Park, A., “Ethnicity and Independence in Estonia,” Europe-Asia Studies 46, no. 1 (1994), 72CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and, Raun, Toivo, “Post-Soviet Estonia, 1991–1993,,” Journal of ‘Baltic Studies 25, no. 1 (Spring 1994), 74Google Scholar.

89 Taagepera, (fn. 86), 222, 223. Taagepera was a member of the assembly.

90 Ibid., 223.

91 Kionka, R., “Estonia: Drafting a New Constitution,” RFE-RL, July 3,1992Google Scholar.

92 The Baltic Independent, July 3–9, 1993, p. 1

93 Lieven, A., The Baltic Revolution, 2d ed. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994), 286Google Scholar.

94 FBIS: Central Eurasia, November 14, 1994. The vote was twenty-five in favor of the amendment and thirty-nine against.

95 Ibid., October 18, 1993.

96 FBIS: Soviet Union, December 26, 1991.

97 Rossiiskaia gazeta, September 11, 1991, p. 2.

98 FBIS: Central Eurasia, May 13, 1993; Krasnaia zvezda, August 26, 1993, p. 3.

99 FBIS: Central Eurasia, May 4, 1993.

100 FBIS (fn. 98).

101 FBIS: Central Eurasia, June 26, 1992.

102 Ibid., January 28, 1994; September 2, 1994; November 10, 1994.

103 Ibid., July 21 1995.

104 In this regard, the Russian case has been likened to O’Donnell’s “delegative democracy.” See Kubicek, P., “Delegative Democracy in Russia and Ukraine,” Communist and Post-Communist Studies 27, no. 4 (1994)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

105 Izvestiia, November 16, 1993, p. 4.

106 Stepan and Skach (fn. 6). In addition, some parliamentary leaders have continued to question the legitimacy of the 1993 constitution.

107 Alimov, K., “Are Central Asian Clans Still Playing a Political Role?” Central Asia Monitor, no. 4 (1994), 16Google Scholar. Six regionally based clans exist in postcommunist Uzbekistan (Western, Eastern, Southern, Tashkent, Bukhara, and Khorezm).

108 Rossiiskaia gazeta, April 30, 1993, p. 6; Alimov (fn. 107), 16, 17; and Carlisle (fn. 51), 37.

109 For the concept of restricted democracy, see Rueschemeyer, D., Stephens, E. Huber, and Stephens, J., Capitalist Development and Democracy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 44Google Scholar.