№ 2 - 2005
Akhremenko A.S.
The Structuring of the Electoral Space in Russia’s Regions. (Factors-Analysis of the Parliamentary Elections of 1995 to 2003)

The article presents an attempt to find out, by methods of factors-analysis, the structure of the space of electoral choice in Russia’s regions. The data that served as the empirical base of the research were the voting data for the total federal district, received following the elections to the State Duma of the 2nd, 3d and 4th convocations (1995, 1999 and 2003), analyzed, however, with the retracing of what was their distribution between territorial election committees for each RF region. The author focused on two electoral choice delimitation varieties that played the “structure generation” role within Russia’s regions during the past three parliamentary election campaigns: the left/right opposition and the elite/power split. In the course of the analysis, the tendency was stated towards the decreasing importance of the left-right continuum and towards the consolidation of the “power” dimension of the electoral space.