Say Ukrainian political scientists
On September 29, Oleksandr Derhachov, Volodymyr Polokhalo, and Serhiy Makeyev, a trio of renowned Ukrainian political scientists involved in editing the journal Political Thought (published in Ukrainian, Russian, and English — Ed.), called a press conference to consider the potential of the so- called administrative resource, quite a high-profile issue on the eve of the upcoming parliamentary elections, and to answer the question whether the administrative resource will play a major role in shaping the course and the results of elections in Ukraine. The trio also declared it wanted to find out if any effective democratic procedure could be used to counterbalance the brake this demonic administrative resource imposes on Ukrainians freely demonstrating their will.
After brushing journalists up on terminology and definitions that the administrative resource as “a means of influencing voters by the ruling groups using the potential of the administrative system to attain their desired goals,” Political Thought Editor-in-Chief Polokhalo pointed out, “Use of the administrative resource is now viewed quietly by society as a normal part of the democratic election process. While the role of this resource is to some extent demonized, its importance in the elections is overestimated while its role in election campaigns is definitely underestimated.” Such underestimation is most dangerous, as the administrative resource is already being used on a large scale, and this was the gist of pundits’ message to journalists.
Moreover, Polokhalo maintained that two-thirds of the resource have already been used up, unlike the last parliamentary elections campaign, during which the administrative resource was used during the voting to rig the returns. “The political regime wants to form such blocs and employ such political players who are not interested in real competition and will not reveal the ideological discrepancies leading to any competition,” he believes. A vivid example of this, he says, is how the Yushchenko bloc (Nasha Ukrayina) is being shaped. Recent developments indicate, according to the political scientist, Our Ukraine is “really a political project run by the Presidential Administration and is in fact a pro-presidential bloc.” Incidentally, this is just like another bloc, dubbed TUNDRA by the media. Polokhalo views Kyiv Mayor Oleksandr Omelchenko’s stepping into the campaign with Yednist (Unity) as another indication of the continued use of the administrative resource. Since Mayor Omelchenko’s bloc will woo the same group of voters as Yushchenko’s, there will be no competition between “these creations of the executive,” Polokhalo argues.
Political Thought Center for Political Analysis and Forecasting Director Serhiy Makeyev singled out the use of administrative resource by such sideline political forces as two of the hitherto virtual blocs, Our Ukraine and the coalition of the Party of the Regions, Labor Ukraine, NDP, Agrarian Party, and the still more ephemeral party of power, which, he thinks, could get 15% of the votes. In other words, if some political force emerges on Ukraine’s horizon, choosing an appropriate name, and says, “We are with the president,” it can count on 15% electoral support.
In the opinion of these political scientists, the next stage in using the administrative resource, something on which both foreign observers and domestic experts have already noted, will exist during the elections and manifest itself in falsifying the election results though election commissions, early voting, as well as voting in the army and prisons. But this will not have any decisive effect on the final returns, as society (the voters, that is), according to Polokhalo’s definition, is trailing with a score 3:1 against the administrative resource. By comparison, at the last elections the score was 3:2, he estimated.
However, the political scientists believe that it is possible to change the established rules of the game, proposing quite strange looking recipes. For instance, Oleksandr Derhachov thinks that one of the few available means still left to fight the administrative resource could be to engage “in a kind of guerrilla warfare within the campaign projects run by the authorities,” with Polokhalo dubbing this “the split of the elite,” adding, “Only splitting the elite forces and starting intense competition among them within the framework of formal institutions can create the basis for political competition,” leading to competitive and, thus, fair and democratic elections.
