Election in Russia will be a vote with few surprises

The result of this weekend's Russian federal parliamentary election is not in doubt.

The pro-Putin United Russia party will win another large majority of seats in the country's first parliamentary election to be held since the start of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

Voting started yesterday and concludes tomorrow.

But three days of voting should not be equated with democracy. This vote is the latest in a long list of tightly controlled elections since Russian President Vladimir Putin came to power more than a quarter of a century ago.

Few expect United Russia not to retain its two-thirds majority in the Duma, the lower house of Russia’s federal parliament. The party has held massive majorities for most election cycles since 2007.

Of the 10 other political parties permitted by authorities to contest the election, four of them are currently represented in the Duma and together, make up about one-third of seats.

Often described by Russia experts as 'managed opposition’, they include: A Just Russia, a party offering a blend of nationalism and socialism, the economically liberal New People, the Communist Party (CPRF), and the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR), an ultranationalist party that is neither liberal nor democratic and works with United Russia.

None of the parties oppose Russia’s war in Ukraine or the system of political repression in the country.

Some, like the Communists and the LDPR, consistently deliver hardline rhetoric about supporting the war.

Under Russia’s parliamentary electoral system, voters cast two ballots: one for political parties, and a second list, showing candidates in their constituency.

450 seats are up for grabs, divided equally between the party list and single constituencies.

Russia’s marginal anti-war party, Yabloko, was barred last month from fielding candidates on the party list, though is allowed to stand a handful of candidates in single constituencies.

Those few candidates are unlikely to make a dent in a political system that ensures total victory for the United Russia, and which allocates a set number of seats for the other pro-Kremlin parties.

With no diversity of parties for voters to choose from, what is the point of the whole exercise?

The elections are "a show", Andrei Pivovarov, an exiled Russian political activist, told RTÉ News.

"Elections matter to Putin primarily as a procedure, and this procedure has three key audiences," he said.

Those audiences, he pointed out, are: the West, Russia’s elite, and thirdly, the Russian public.

Mr Pivovarov spent more than three years in a Russian penal colony for membership of an "undesirable organisation". He had been the director of Open Russia, a now-disbanded pro-democracy movement.

Released in August 2024 as part of the largest exchange of prisoners between Russia and Western intelligence agencies since the end of the Cold War, he now lives in Germany.

"Putin needs to preserve at least a degree of formal legitimacy to demonstrate that elections are being held in Russia and that, on formal grounds, other countries should therefore recognise him as the president of Russia," said Mr Pivovarov.

The Russian leader also uses the staging of elections in Russia as a way of trying to undermine the legitimacy of the Ukrainian leadership.

Mr Putin has repeatedly made the point that Ukraine has not held elections while leaving aside questions over rigged elections and the absence of actual opposition parties in Russia.

Ukraine has not held elections since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion due to the imposition of martial law.

This weekend's parliamentary elections will also demonstrate to Russia’s elite that Mr Putin’s rule remains firm.

A presidential election two years ago, which Mr Putin officially won with 88% of the votes, played the same role.

"It is particularly important for Putin now to go through this procedure and once again demonstrate to the elite that, despite the war, economic problems and growing public dissatisfaction, he remains the leader supported by the majority," said Mr Pivovarov.

And then there is the Russian public.

"The presentation of high voting figures also helps reinforce the domestic narrative that society as a whole is prepared to continue the war and supports the current course," said Mr Pivovarov.

In this election campaign, United Russia has focused heavily on patriotism and what it presents as the need for national unity around the war in Ukraine.

'Strength in Unity’ has been one of the party’s main slogans in the campaign.

Dozens of Russian army veterans are also contesting seats for United Russia.

"We are one people and we will fight together for the flag, for our motherland to defend its interests," said Mr Putin at United Russia’s party congress last month.

"I am sure that the upcoming elections will confirm the stability of the state," said Russia’s president.

But Russia's economy has become less stable this year after largely withstanding the impact of Western sanctions for the first four years of the invasion.

A summer of Ukrainian drone strikes on fuel depots and retail warehouses deep inside Russia resulted in long queues for petrol and disrupted supply lines for the country’s retail sector.

To counter public concern over the economy, United Russia has placed considerable emphasis in this campaign on promoting its record on domestic issues such as access to housing, healthcare and education, which it claims the party has improved during recent years.

Analysis by Election Atlas, an independent Russian election monitoring project, found that as well as mentions of support for the war, many posts on United Russia social media channels focused on urban development, communal services, healthcare and education.

Regional branches of the party were instructed to emphasise the number of schools built, and rural health clinics opened in recent years as part of their campaign material, according to reporting by Meduza, an independent Russia news outlet, based in Latvia.

Both the Communists and the New People party could attract some protest voters who want to see United Russia's majority weakened.

Though it stays tight-lipped on the war in Ukraine, New People was the only party in the Duma to criticise the introduction of internet restrictions earlier this year. So the party may pick up a few anti-establishment votes.

But do not expect any major breakout from the managed opposition. Their role in the system is to remain small and compliant.

Sabine Fischer, a Russia policy expert at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs wrote this week that, over the past two decades, the Kremlin has "shaped a 'party system' designed to simulate representativeness".

"The state administration controls this system by playing all the parties off against one another and ensuring the dominance of the ruling party, United Russia".

A thumping new majority for United Russia is likely to be presented by the Kremlin as a sign of high public support for the war, and that could spell a period of further escalation from Moscow.

Ukrainian intelligence has said that the Kremlin plans to order a mass mobilisation of reservists after the Duma elections, a claim that Mr Putin has described as "utter nonsense".

But then again, the Kremlin also denied rumours that Russian forces planned a mobilisation in September 2022 only for Russia's president to enact a partial mobilisation one week later.

It would be unwise to rule out a similar course of action being taken by the Kremlin in the months ahead.