In the December 2011 protests that shook Russia, civic mobilization took place in two phases: first, in the form of a protest vote during the December State Duma elections, and second, in the postelection street protests in Moscow and in Russia’s larger regional capitals. To its credit, the Russian opposition was able to quickly tie the problem of electoral fraud to the current structure of the Russian political system, and to speedily organize large protest rallies in response. Yet more needs to be done.
About the Author
Denis Volkov is a researcher at the Yuri Levada Center, an independent Moscow-based organization devoted to the analysis of Russian public life. He comments frequently on politics in the Russian media and studies youth political engagement, the sources and limits of democratization, and the role of digital media in social and political change. This essay was translated from the Russian by Patrick Walsh.
Russia has witnessed a growing rapprochement between some of its nationalists and some of its democrats, but this trend is threatened by divisions over the annexation of Crimea.
On the evening of 20 November 1998, Galina Vasilievna Starovoitova was shot to death outside her St. Petersburg apartment. She was the sixth member of the Russian Duma to have…
