The Russian presidential election, March 2000

White, S.L. (2001) The Russian presidential election, March 2000. Electoral Studies, 20(3), pp. 484-489. (doi: 10.1016/S0261-3794(00)00053-6)

Abstract

Boris Yeltsin became Russia's first elected president in June 1991. With support from the country's richest bankers and the media they controlled, he won again in a two-round contest in June and July 1996. Under the terms of the Russian constitution a president can be elected for no more than two consecutive terms. However, strictly speaking, Yeltsin had been elected in 1991 to the presidency of a republic that was still part of the USSR; his election in 1996 had been to the presidency of an independent state under a new and rather different constitution. The Constitutional Court nevertheless ruled that Yeltsin's election in 1996 had to count as the beginning of a second, not a first, term of office. This meant that he could not legally stand again when his term expired in the summer of 2000, so some form of political succession was unavoidable.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: White, Professor Stephen
• Authors: White, S.L.
• College/School: College of Social Sciences > School of Social and Political Sciences > Politics
• Journal Name: Electoral Studies
• ISSN: 0261-3794
• ISSN (Online): 1873-6890
• Published Online: 08 June 2001