Emerging Party Systems in Post-Soviet Societies: A Study of Party Activists

最近的政治学文献反映了关于后苏联社会政党和政党制度形成的日益激烈的争论。这场争论的最终结果对我们对政党制度如何形成以及政党在发展中的民主国家中发挥的作用的基本理解具有影响。实质性辩论的重点是前苏联新独立国家中出现的政党是否表现出使我们能够得出结论认为它们构成了竞争性多党制的政治特征的问题。在这一质疑的两边都出现了两个截然不同的阵营。一组学者借鉴了传统的政党形成理论，认为后共产主义国家制度化政党制度的形成将是一个漫长而艰巨的过程，因为这些社会缺乏以前的多党社会化。他们认为，当前的后苏联政党是昙花一现的，在政策偏好方面缺乏坚实的基础，因此反映出的只不过是该党领导人的粉丝俱乐部。与争论相反的是，最近的研究显示，认同某个政党并投票给自己认同的政党的后苏联公民比例迅速上升。到目前为止，双方在这场辩论中提出的经验证据都是有限的，而且没有定论。这项调查首次提供了关于俄罗斯、乌克兰和立陶宛的比较数据，其中包括关于政党组织、选民中的政党和政府中的政党目前达到的制度化程度的直接可比证据。调查员先前的研究提供了选民和政府中政党的数据。本研究对政党作为组织进行了系统的研究。关于政党结构和政党积极分子态度的信息是通过对俄罗斯和乌克兰各400名政党积极分子和领导人以及立陶宛200名政党积极分子的面对面调查访谈获得的。由此产生的数据集提供了对这三个后苏联社会的党组织的第一次全面检查。这些数据为未来对这些新民主国家政党发展的研究提供了一个基准。对于对前苏联新民主国家的政党崛起感兴趣的学者来说，该数据集将非常有用。

Recent political science literature reflects a growing controversy regarding the formation of political parties and party systems in post-Soviet societies. The eventual outcome of the controversy holds implications for our basic understanding of how party systems form and the role parties play in developing democracies. The substantive debate is focused on the questions of whether or not the political parties that have emerged in the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union exhibit the types of political characteristics that allow us to conclude that they constitute a competitive multi-party system. Two distinct camps have emerged on either side of this query. One set of scholars, drawing upon traditional theories of party formation, argue that the formation of institutionalized party systems in post-Communist states will be a long and arduous process because these societies lack previous multi-party socialization. They see the current post-Soviet parties as ephemeral, lacking a firm foundation in policy preferences, thus reflecting nothing more substantial than a fan club for the party's leader. On the opposite side of the argument, recent research reveals a rapid rise in the proportion of post-Soviet citizens who identify with a political party and who vote for the party with which they identify. To date the empirical evidence presented in this debate, on both sides, has been limited and inconclusive. This investigation provides the first comparative data on Russia, Ukraine and Lithuania that incorporates directly comparable evidence on the level of institutionalization currently attained by party organizations, parties in the electorate and the parties in government. Prior research of the investigator provides the data on parties in the electorate and in government. This study carries out a systematic study of parties as organizations. Information on party structures and the attitudes of party activists is obtained through face-to-face survey interviews with 400 party activists and leaders in each of Russia and Ukraine, and 200 party activists in Lithuania. The resulting dataset provides the first comprehensive examination of party organizations in these three post-Soviet societies. The data provide a benchmark for future studies of party development in these new democracies. The dataset will be of great use to scholars interested in political party emergence in new democracies of the former Soviet Union.