THE NOMINATION OF CANDIDATES FOR DEPUTIES AS A RITUAL ELEMENT OF SOVIET OSTENSIBLE DEMOCRACY

Abstract

The study deals with features of the procedure of the nomination of candidates for workers' deputies during the election campaigns to the Supreme Soviets of the USSR, the Ukrainian SSR, and local governments in the Ukrainian SSR of the post-war period. Legislative, organizational, and propaganda aspects of the process of running for power are analyzed. The procedure did not comply with constitutional norms, as, contrary to the Constitution, only one non-alternative candidate was nominated from each constituency, using non-legal buttons of their selection. Pre-election meetings were defined as one of the fundamental steps of the electoral process and as a ritual element of Soviet ostensible democracy. Pre-election events were controlled by party bodies, which neutralized the democratic principles of forming a representative branch of government and made it impossible to create a truly popular representation. The author defines the criteria that the authorities used for forming the deputy corps of different levels and describes the ideal version of the Soviet representative of the people. Describing officials' difficulties in nominating candidates for deputies to local councils, the author gives statistics and reasons for the rejection of nominees at this level at the election meeting. Difficulties in the organization and conduct of the nomination procedure in the western regions of the Ukrainian SSR due to the prevalence of anti-Soviet sentiment in the region and the activities of the nationalist underground were noted. It has been observed that every year citizens showed a more and more indifferent attitude to the elections due to the formality and politicization of the election procedure. Moreover, the parliamentary representation formed under party control did not correlate with society's political and social stratification. Keywords: Ukrainian SSR, postwar period, Soviet election campaigns, election meetings, candidates for workers' deputies.