Publication |
2011.
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Summary/Abstract |
RUSSIAN ELECTORAL LEGISLATION IS BASED ON a Federal Law 'On the Basic
Guarantees of Electoral Rights and the Right of Russian Federation Citizens to
Participate in a Referendum',1 which provides a framework for all elections across the
country (hereafter, the Federal Law 'On the Basic Guarantees of Electoral Rights', or
the 'framework law'). This law takes priority over regional electoral legislation.
Therefore, ever since this framework legislation was first enacted in 1995, the
development dynamics of regional electoral legislation have been shaped by the
changes to this law. However, while in the past this framework law had only been
amended once or twice over a four-year election cycle, since 2004 it has been
continually amended (Lyubarev 2009a). Thus, for example, over the four years of its
mandate, the fourth State Duma of 2003-2007 amended the 'Law on the Basic
Guarantees' 17 times, whilst the fifth Duma amended it 14 times in its first two years
(2007-2009).
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