Liberal-Democratic Party Of Russia Research Articles

Zhirinovsky Before Politics A Curriculum Vitae 1946–1989

A number of publications in various languages have, to one degree or another, dealt with the biography of the leader of the so-called Liberal-Democratic Party of Russia until its foundation in December 1989. Yet, none of them has provided a satisfactory account of Vladimir Zhirinovsky’s life before be entered politics. This chronology presents, in a condensed form, most of the relevant dates, events and names mentioned in various primary and secondary sources. While being in need of verification, addition, and interpretation, the below “fact sheet” constitutes a first step towards a comprehensive biography of Zhirinovsky.

Russian Fascism: Traditions, Tendencies, Movements by Stephen D. s> Shenfield (review)

372 SEER, 8i, 2, 2003 Inside Russia, his huge popularity as an opponent of Communism and a decisive foil to an increasingly bewildered Gorbachev was soon dissipated. Russians began to blame him as much as Gorbachev for the loss of empire and prestige abroad, and for the decline in living standardswhich all but a minority experienced. They were furious at the way, as they saw it, that he allowed a handful of villains to plunder the property of the state. They felt personally humiliated by his erratic behaviour, his drunkenness,the bizarre incidentswhich puncturedhispublic appearances,and by his lengthy bouts of sickness. They were unpleasantly reminded of the humiliating years of the Soviet gerontocracy at the turn of theig80s. They embraced El'tsin'syoung, sober and decisive successoras soon as they got the chance. Now is perhapsnot the best time to be publishinga new book about El'tsin. The instant books, the journalistic accounts have all been published. El'tsin and many in his immediate entouragehave alreadygiven theirown versionof events: the rascallymemoirs of his former bodyguard are amongst the most engaging, provided you add the necessary amount of salt. In his massive biography(reltsin.ARevolutionay Life,London, 2000), LeonAronhasexamined and digested much of the availablematerial.He went backto El'tsin'srootsin Ekaterinburg,then called Sverdlovsk.He interviewed those who had known El'tsin as a young man, and those who were his colleagues in later life. His book isprettyclose to the currentstateof the art.Booksdo continue to emerge which cast additionallight on particularaspectsof El'tsin'scareer. One of the most recent and valuable is Strobe Talbott's 7The RussiaHand (New York, 2002), which throwsan intimate light on the relationshipbetween El'tsinand Clinton. Robert Service gives a more general perpsectivein Russia.Experiment witha People (London, 2002). But it will not be easy to add much substance until the archivesbegin to open, and until distance enables historiansto get a broaderperspectiveon the man and his age. Any worthwhile new book on El'tsin, therefore, has to meet some very demanding criteria.Andrew Felkay'spedestrianbook failsthe test. It contains no new insights. It trawls through a limited number of the most obvious sources,without anyevidence of seriousresearch.Itsummarizes reasonably efficiently -some of the knownfacts.Butitputsthem into an odd proportion. It pays substantialattention to minor incidents, such as the mystery(which it does not solve) of El'tsin'sfall into the Moscow riverin September I989. But it passestoo lightly over the Balticcrisisof I 990 and I 99I, and it failsto get to gripswith the centralproblem of El'tsinand the economy. It saysnothing new or illuminating about its ostensible subject, the relationshipbetween El'tsin's Russia and the West. It will do as a text book for firstyear students, but not more than that. London RODRIc BRAITHWAITE Shenfield, Stephen D. RussianFascism.Traditions, Tendencies, Movements. M. E. Sharpe, Armonk, NY and London, 2001. Xiv+ 336 pp. Notes. Bibliography .Index. $66.95; $29.95. THEriot that broke out on the Manege Square in CentralMoscow on 9 June 2002, followingthe I-o victoryofJapan over Russia in the soccerWorldCup, REVIEWS 373 showed the potential for racistviolence in Russiatoday. At the very time when a law against political extremism was before the State Duma, some of those who had been watching the match on a large-screen television rampaged through the streets, seeking foreigners to attack, injuring scores of people, resulting in at least one death. It was generally agreed in Moscow that this contemporarypogrom was not spontaneousbut organized. These events regrettablydemonstrated the relevance of Stephen D. Shenfield 's excellent volume, Russian Fascism. This is an encyclopaedic historyand analysis of Russian nationalist and extremist organizations in the I99os. He drawson theprogrammes,publicationsandwebsitesof thegroups,on Russian Press reports and particularlyon the valuable work of the Panorama experts in Moscow, Vladimir Pribylovskiiand Aleksandr Verkhovskii.The groups Shenfield covers include the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, tendencies within the Russian Orthodox Church, Vladimir Zhirinovskii's Liberal-DemocraticPartyof Russia, RussianNational Unity (RNE), formerly led by Aleksandr Barkashov, and Eduard Limonov's National-Bolshevik Party, as well as some smaller groups. He discussesmore amorphous trends, such as pagans, Cossacks, skinheadsand football supporters;and provides a most interesting discussion of the esoteric ideas of Aleksandr Dugin...

The Republics and Regions of the Russian Federation: A Guide to Politics, Policies, and Leaders by Robert W. Orttung, Danielle N. Lussier, and Anna Paretskaya; and The Fiscal Structure of the Russian Federation: Financial Flows between the Center and the Regions by A. M. Lavrov and Alexei G. Makushkin (review)

592 SEER, 79, 3, 200I the analysissuffersfromthe fact that the processof publishingmaterialis slow and recent developmentshave thereforebeen omitted. The last chapter, by Claudia Lohnig, discusses the evolution of output structuresin transition countries and make some comparisons with Greece, Portugal and Spain (again, Ireland is excluded, without clear explanation). The author argues that convergence in the structures of manufacturing towardsthe EU patternsmay be linked to an increasein intra-industrytrade. Despite the fact that the argumentis compelling, insufficientevidence is given to supportthisthesis. On the whole, thisbook may be usefulfor those interestedin readingabout macroeconomic aspectsof capitalinflows,tradeand exchange ratepolicies. It offerssome new insights as well as a very good overview of the main issues. However anybody interested in up-to-date research results should consult more focusedpapers. School ofSlavonic andEastEuropean Studies T. M. MICKIEWICZ University College London Orttung, Robert W., Lussier, Danielle N., Paretskaya, Anna (eds). The Republics andRegions oftheRussian Federation. A Guide toPolitics,Policies, and Leaders. EastWestInstituteand M. E. Sharpe,Armonk,NY, and London, 2000. xxvii + 679 pp. Maps. Tables.Appendices. Index. $225.00. Lavrov,A. M., and Makushkin,Alexei G. (eds),with a forewordbyAlexander G. Granberg. TheFiscalStructure of theRussianFederation. FinancialFlows Between theCenter andtheRegions. M. E. Sharpe, NY, and London, 2000. xxxvii + 233 pp. Tables. Figures. Maps. Glossary. Bibliography.Index. $125.00. BOTH of these works are essential for anyone trying to make sense of the dynamics of Russian regionalism. The book edited by Orttung and his colleaguesat the EastWestInstitutein New Yorkis an encyclopaedicreference guide to Russia's 89 regions, offering an overview of each region, some demographic, economic and electoral statistics,a description of the region's political institutions, some discussion of the main policy orientations of the regional leadership, an analysisof relations with Moscow and other regions, and, where relevant, foreign policy issues. In addition, the book provides usefulthumbnailsketchesof majorregional actors, including the biographies of major political and economic elites, and some evaluation of the overall business climate in the region. Entries are alphabetical, beginning with Adygeya and ending with Yaroslavl, with each concluding with contact information for the regional leadership and important regional world-wideweb sites. In his Introduction Orttung generalizes some of the data contained in individualregional entries. Followinga general discussionof Russia'sfederal structure, Orttung provides a brief prosopographic analysis of Russia's governors.Thus we learn that in 2000 the averageage of a governorwas 53.5 yearsold, and that at thattime therewas only one female governor(Valentina Bronevichof the KoryakAutonomous Okrug,who lost her seat in late 2000). REVIEWS 593 Just over half the governors had a background in economic management, with twenty-one (24 per cent) beginning their professional lives in the agricultural sector, while sixteen (i8 per cent) were industrialists,and six workedin the constructionindustry.Not surprisingly,the dominant ideology of the guvernatorial corps is that of supra-partytechnocratic governance. Such an approach is reinforced by the fact that the single largest cohort (twenty-two, or 25 per cent) emerged out of the top officialdom of the Communist Partyof the Soviet Union (CPSU), with two of them having been members of the party's Politiburo (Orel's Egor Stroev and North Ossetia's Aleksandr Dzasokhov). Overall, some 44 governors (49 per cent) had significant experience serving in the CPSU's ranks. Only one governor, Evgenii Mikhailov of Pskov, used another party (Vladimir Zhirinovskii's LiberalDemocratic Partyof Russia, LDPR) as his trampolineto power. The limitedutilityof partyaffiliationin Russia'sregionalpoliticswasdemonstrated by Mikhailov's subsequent repudiation of the LDPR, and more broadly by the chronic tensions between governors who are formally affiliatedwith the CPSU's successor party, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF), and the CPRF'sleadershipand rank-and-file. The key relationship stressed by Orttung is between the governor and Moscow. He suggests seven ways in which the Kremlin can influence regional politics, ranging from intervention in regional election campaigns to the signing of the 46 power-sharing treaties. In turn, governors exercise considerable authority in their own regions, often dominating the local economy, influencing regional and national elections, capturing federal agencies working in their region, and blocking the implementation of federal programmes. As time passed they became more adept at ensuring their own re-election, although in most cases this did not involve the direct...

Political Geographies and Cleavages in the Russian Parliamentary Elections

Spatial-structural regression models are fitted for the votes of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia and for the combined vote of the Communist Party of Russia and the Agrarian Party in the parliamentary elections of 1993 and 1995. Analysis of the regression-model results indicates that sets of explanatory socioeconomic variables, as well as their relative importance in explanation of the anti-reform vote, vary widely across the country. More specifically, the paper documents an emerging European/Asian dichotomization of Russia's electoral geography, and assesses the increasingly important role of region in the democratization process as the spatial impress of the economic transformation of the country becomes more evident. 3 figures, 2 tables, 64 references. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: H10, J18, O50.

A Liberal by Misunderstanding

When I started to read [Lost Chance:] Notes of a Market Romantic, I was mentally prepared to defend their author, who raised the banner of economic liberalism quite a long time ago, against occasionally unfair criticism. Real liberalism (not caricatured liberalism of the sort proposed by the LDPR [Liberal Democratic Party of Russia]) has not as yet won numerous and influential supporters in our country and therefore the selfless efforts, as they seemed to me, to clarify and affirm liberal ideas in society evoked [my] sincere respect.