Posts by Chiara Loda

By Fabian Burkhardt (@fa_burkhardt) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here Rulers cannot rule alone. This simple wisdom is oftentimes forgotten with regard to Putin’s Russia. This blog post summarises a paper presented at the BASEES Annual Conference in Cambridge that attempts a systematic inquiry into the institutionalization of Russia’s ‘institutional presidency’ – the Presidential…

By Ben Noble  (benjamin.noble@politics.ox.ac.uk, @Ben_H_Noble) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here The Russian newspaper Vedomosti recently reported something that may strike many as rather odd. Drawing on a range of internal sources, the paper claimed that the Russian Presidential Administration was increasingly using members of the Federation Council – the upper chamber of the Federal Assembly,…

By Dmitriy Nurumov This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here On 20 March 2016, the day of parliamentary elections, President Nazarbayev, answering a question from a journalist regarding possible changes to the Constitution, stated: “Changes should be made. The Presidential system of governance exists in Kazakhstan. We can only talk about re-distribution of…

By Eugene Huskey This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here Outside of Latin America, where one-term limitations on presidencies are relatively common, only the Philippines, South Korea, Vanuatu, and Kyrgyzstan restrict their presidents to a single term.[i]  Kyrgyzstan introduced this restriction in its 2010 Constitution in order to prevent the repetition of “family…

By Ann Tsurtsumia-Zurabashvili (@TsurtsumiaA ) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here Giorgi Margvelashvili, 47, the fourth president of Georgia was elected in 2013 with 62 percent in direct popular vote. Prior to his presidential nomination, he served as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Education and Science in the government of PM Bidzina…

By Eugene Huskey This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here In the days before and after Donald Trump’s inauguration on January 20, 2017, the Russian press provided extensive coverage of the American transition of power (see Table below).  Based on a reading of all articles on Donald Trump that were published in eight…

By Eugene Huskey This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here In a referendum that generated fierce opposition from critics of Kyrgyzstani President Almazbek Atambaev, voters approved 26 revisions to Kyrgyzstan’s constitution on December 11, 2016.[i]  It was the seventh constitutional plebiscite since the adoption of the country’s original post-communist constitution in May 1993,…

By Ann Tsurtsumia-Zurabashvili (@TsurtsumiaA ) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here On November 16, the Central Election Commission (CEC) of Georgia published its final summary protocol for October 2016 Parliamentary elections. The CEC confirmed that three electoral subjects: Georgian Dream – Democratic Georgia (GDDG), United National Movement (UNM) and the Alliance of Patriots would enter…

By Chiara Loda (@ChiaraLoda) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here In 2015, after a referendum, Armenia voted to switch from a semi-presidential political system to a parliamentarian one. As a consequence of that, most governing prerogatives are due to shift from the president to the prime minister. This change has been accompanied by discussions…

  By Ann Tsurtsumia-Zurabashvili (@TsurtsumiaA ) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here On October 8, 2016 Georgia held a parliamentary elections to elect 150 MPs using a mixed electoral system. According to this system voters elected 73 MPs in majoritarian, single-seat constituencies, while the remaining 77 seats were distributed proportionally in a closed party-list contest,…

By Chiara Loda (@ChiaraLoda) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here On 26 September, citizens of Azerbaijan were called to vote in a constitutional referendum. The constitution, approved in 1995, was already amended in 2002 and 2009. While the current amendments concern numerous topics (including civic liberties and right of assembly), some of them specifically…

By Eugene Huskey This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here Amid challenging economic conditions, Russian voters went to the polls on Sunday, September 18 to elect the 450 members of the country’s lower house, the Duma. They also cast ballots in seven gubernatorial races, in contests for seats in 39 of 85 regional…

By Chiara Loda (@ChiaraLoda) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here From 17-19 June, the Formula One Grand Prix took place in Baku. In contrast to the “European Games” in 2015, the race received limited attention from governmental actors and the Azerbaijani media. Two explanations are possible. The first lies in the changed domestic circumstances.…

By Ann Tsurtsumia-Zurabashvili (@TsurtsumiaA ) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here Election date misunderstanding Under the constitution, the Georgian Parliament’s 150 members serve four-year terms, with 77 seats set by proportional representation and 73 in single-seat constituencies. Georgia’s constitution calls for the next parliamentary elections to be held in October, with the country’s…

By Eugene Huskey This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here As the widely-followed American presidential primaries wound down, Russia was quietly experimenting with its own version of political primaries.[i]  For the first time in Russian history, a political party, United Russia, used a nationwide primary election to select its parliamentary candidates, who will…

By Chiara Loda (@ChiaraLoda) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here In the aftermath of the “4 Days War” in Nagorno-Karabakh, the Armenian President, Serzh Sarkisian, declared that, in the case of resumed hostilities, his country would recognize the de facto Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh. One month after, a bill titled “On recognition of Republic Artsakh [Nagorno-Karabakh]”,…

By Ann Tsurtsumia-Zurabashvili (@TsurtsumiaA ) This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here The Georgian Dream Coalition, which has ruled the country and held a majority in parliament since the elections of 2012, has dissolved just months before the next parliamentary elections. Although the major opposition and the former ruling party, the United National Movement, began…

By Dmitry Nurumov and Vasil Vashchanka This post was originally published in Presidential Power and is available here The 20 March 2015 parliamentary elections in Kazakhstan did not surprise seasoned observers. Yet again, elections attested to the President’s Nazarbayev’s firm grip on the political life of the country and the absence of real political opposition. Like many previous…