Russia’s Parliamentary Parties Attract Different People Not So Much by Different Programs as by Different Emotional Appeals, INSOMAR Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 1 – INSOMAR, the Moscow Institute of Social Marketing on the basis of a survey says that Russians divide in their votes for the country’s parliamentary parties not because these parties offer radically different political programs than because they appeal to very different emotions.

            Using INSOMAR’s findings (t.me/insomar/499), the Club of the Regions identifies what it says are the differences among the parties in terms of the emotional appeals they have made to voters (club-rf.ru/theme/733). Here is how the Club’s experts describe the basic voters of four of these groups:

·       United Russia voters have enormous pride in their country and most of them expect positive changes in the country in the coming years.

·       KPRF voters in contrast are unhappy with the state of things in the country and a majority believe that worse times are ahead.

·       LDPR voters are proud of their country but say they are fed up with government news and are more likely than any of the others to articulate local and regional identities.

·       The New Peoples Party voters are the only party a majority of whom does not consider themselves supporters of any political powers. They are more economically active and want the state to stop interfering with the internet and let people work.

Neither INSOMAR nor the Party of the Regions talked much about Just Russia, a reflection of the fact that that party had a less clearly defined emotional content and thus was unable to set itself apart and attract voters on that basis than were the other four.