1. For example, Timothy Heritage and Ralph Boulton, “Russia’s Putin and party suffer election blow,” Reuters, December 4, 2011, at http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCATRE7B019B20111204 (last accessed April 13,2016); “Losing their grip” 2011, The Economist December 5, 2011, at http://www.economist.com/blogs/easternapproaches/2011/12/russias-election (last accessed January 13, 2016); and Shevtsova, Lilia, “Putinism Under Siege: Implosion, Atrophy, or Revolution?,” Journal of Democracy 23, no. 3, (July, 2012): 19–32 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Some, including Shevtsova, argued that this was not just a loss of electoral support, but a loss of legitimacy on the part of the regime.

2. For example, McAllister, Ian and White, Stephen, “‘It’s the Economy Comrade!’ Parties and Voters in the 2007 Russian Duma Election,” Europe-Asia Studies 60, no. 6, (July 2008): 931-57CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Myagkov, Mikhail, Ordeshook, Peter C. and Shakin, Dimitri, The Forensics of Election Fraud: Russia and Ukraine (Cambridge, Eng., 2009), 135-37CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Sakwa, Richard, Pufin: Russia’s Choice (London, 2008), 117 Google Scholar; Zimmerman, William, Ruling Russia: Authoritarianism from the Revolution to Putin (Princeton, 2014), 267-90CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Colton, Timothy J. and Hale, Henry E.. “The Putin Vote: Presidential Electorates in a Hybrid Regime,” Slavic Review 68, no. 3, (Fall 2009): 473–503 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3. This is acknowledged by many leading scholars of this type of regime, for example, see Schedler, Andreas, The Politics of Uncertainty: Sustaining and Subverting Electoral Authoritarianism (Oxford, 2013)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Levitsky, Steven and Way, Lucan A., Competitive Authoritarianism: Hybrid Regimes After the Cold War, (Cambridge, Eng., 2010)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4. On this see Diamond, Larry Jay, “Thinking About Hybrid Regimes,” Journal of Democracy 13, no. 2, (April 2002): 21–35 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Schedler, Andreas ed., Electoral Authoritarianism: The Dynamics of Unfree Competition, (Boulder, 2006)Google Scholar; and Levitsky and Way, Competitive Authoritarianism.

5. Levitsky and Way, Competitive Authoritarianism, 16.

6. Schedler, The Politics of Uncertainty, 105-07.

7. For example, Schedler, Electoral Authoritarianism, 3-6, although he seems to have later changed his mind; Greene, Kenneth F., Why Dominant Parties Lose: Mexico’s Democratization in Comparative Perspective, (Cambridge, Eng., 2007), 14 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

8. Hyde, Susan D., Marinov, Nikolay, and Troeger, Vera, “Which Elections Can Be Lost?,” Political Analysis 20, no. 2, (Spring 2012), 194 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Also Levitsky and Way, Competitive Authoritarianism, ch.l.

9. Roessler, Phillip G. and Howard, Marc M., “Post-Cold War Political Regimes: When Do Elections Matter?, “ in Lindberg, Staffan I., ed., Democratization by Elections: A New Mode of Transition (Baltimore, 2009), 110 Google Scholar; Magaloni, Beatriz, Voting for Autocracy: Hegemonic Party Survival and Its Demise in Mexico, (Cambridge, Eng., 2006), 35 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10. Case, William, “Malaysia’s Resilient Pseudodemocracy,” Journal of Democracy 12, no. 1, (January 2001): 49 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11. Greene, Why Dominant Parties Lose, 2.

12. As recognized by both Schedler, The Politics of Uncertainty and Levitsky and Way, Competitive Authoritarianism.

13. On the problems with measuring the potential for electoral competition, see Hyde and Marinov, Which Elections Can Be Lost, 191-210.

14. For one discussion, see Magaloni, Voting for Autocracy, 8-10.

15. Open voting refers to the practice of groups being told to vote in a certain way, with each member having to prove that they obeyed by showing their ballot to others in the group.

16. On the shorter lifespan of personalist than party regimes, see Geddes, Barbara, Paradigms and Sand Castles: Theory Building and Research Design in Comparative Politics (Ann Arbor, 2003), 78 Google Scholar.

17. Linz, Juan J., “An Authoritarian Regime: Spain,” in Allardt, Erik and Rokkan, Stein, eds., Mass Politics. Studies in Political Sociology (New York, 1970), 257-59Google Scholar.

18. This is the basis of commitment emphasized by Svolik, Milan W., The Politics of Authoritarian Rule (Cambridge, Eng., 2012), ch.6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

19. Usually said to reflect a decline in popular legitimacy. For example, Gel’man, Vladimir, “Cracks in the Wall. Challenges to Electoral Authoritarianism in Russia,” Problems of Post-Communism 60, no. 2, (2013): 3–10 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Shevtsova, Implosion, Atrophy, or Revolution?; and Krastev, Ivan and Holmes, Stephen, “An Autopsy of Managed Democracy,” Journal of Democracy 23, no. 3, (July 2012): 33–45 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

20. For example, Shevtsova, Implosion, Atrophy, or Revolution?; and Krastev and Holmes, An Autopsy of Managed Democracy. Also see Robertson, Graeme, “Protesting Putinism: The Election Protests of 2011-12 in Broader Perspective,” Problems of Post-Communism, 60, no. 2, (March 2013): 11–23 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21. March, Luke, “Managing Opposition in a Hybrid Regime: Just Russia and Parastatal Opposition,” Slavic Review 68, no. 3, (Fall 2009): 514 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

22. Novaia gazeta, 15 March 2011, http://www.novayagazeta.ru/politics/6721.html (last accessed April 13, 2016).

23. http://www.levada.ru/25.ll.2011/noyabrskie-reitingi-odobreniya-i-doveriya-reitingi-partii (accessed December 12, 2011). (content no longer available)

24. Russian Public Opinion 2010-2011. Annual (Moscow, 2012), 51-52, 176.

25. On the view that the political leaders were in charge of and shaped economic policy, see Russian Public Opinion, 64.

26. Russian Public Opinion, 119,121.

27. For some figures on trust in institutions, see White, Stephen, Understanding Russian Politics (Cambridge, Eng., 2011), 53 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

28. Reuter, Ora John, “Regional patrons and hegemonic party electoral performance in Russia,” Post-Soviet Affairs 29, no. 2, (May 2013): 101-35Google Scholar.

29. On governors and producing electoral support, see Reuter, Ora John and Robertson, Graeme B., “Subnational Appointments in Authoritarian Regimes: Evidence from Russian Gubernatorial Appointments,” The Journal of Politics 74, no. 4, (October 2012): 1023-37CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

30. The pattern was not consistent across the country, with some areas like Chechnya reporting its standard high level of support for UR while other areas like Moscow fell well short. On the link between UR’s electoral success and governors having authority in the regions sufficient to be able to mobilize voters, see Reuter, Regional patrons and hegemonic party.

31. For one discussion of this, see Gill, Graeme, “The Decline of a Dominant Party and the Destabilization of Electoral Authoritarianism?,” Post-Soviet Affairs 28, no. 4, (2012): 449-71CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

32. Reuter, Ora John, “The Politics of Dominant Party Formation: United Russia and Russia’s Governors,” Europe-Asia Studies 62, no. 2, (February 2010): 300 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

33. For an argument that regional unity is quite superficial, and therefore party affiliation is light, see Slider, Darrell, “How United is United Russia? Regional Sources of Intra-party Conflict,” The Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics 26, no. 2, (May 2010): 257-75CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

34. Reuter, Ora John, “United Russia and the 2011 Elections,” Russian Analytical Digest, no. 102, September 26, 2011: 6.Google Scholar

35. For one study that analyses local power configurations, see Stoner-Weiss, Kathryn, locar Heroes: The Political Economy of Russian Regional Governance (Princeton, 1997)Google Scholar. Also see Reuter, , Regional patrons and hegemonic party and Hale, Henry E., Why Not Parties in Russia?: Democracy, Federalism, and the State (Cambridge, Eng., 2006)Google ScholarPubMed.

36. For one argument, see Reuter, Regional patrons and hegemonic party.

37. Unity was created in September 1999 and in December 2001 it merged with Fatherland-All Russia to create United Russia.

38. Roberts, Sean P., Putin’s United Russia Party (London, 2012), 33 Google Scholar.

39. For the argument that access to resources was a significant factor in the timing of decisions by governors to join UR, see Reuter, The Politics of Dominant Party Formation. Also see Reuter, Ora John and Remington, Thomas F., “Dominant Party Regimes and the Commitment Problem: The Case of United Russia,” Comparative Political Studies 42, no. 4, (April 2009): 501-26CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

40. For one case where a governor who was a party member implemented policy directly at odds with that espoused by the party and president, see Mari, Aburamoto, “Who Takes Care of the Residents? United Russia and the Regions Facing the Monetization of L’goty,” Acta Slavica laponica no. 28 (2010): 101-15.Google Scholar

41. That this was recognized is reflected in the way in which government ministers were dispatched into some of the regions to head up the party’s electoral list in an attempt to attract votes. Reuter, United Russia and the 2011 Elections, 4.

42. For reports, see Berliand, Irina and Stupakova, Marina, eds., Razgnevannye nabliudateli. Fal’sifikatsii parlamentskikh vyborov gl’azami ochevidtsev (Moscow, 2012)Google Scholar.

43. For a sophisticated discussion, see Anatoly Karlin, “Measuring Churov’s Beard. The Mathematics of Russian Election Fraud,” at http://www.sublimeoblivion.com/2011/12/26/measuring-churovs-beard/ (last accessed January 26, 2012) (content no longer available).

44. For an argument about the consequences of a party losing control over those who administer the electoral system in regard to Mexico, see Magaloni, Voting for Autocracy, 38.

45. OSCE/ODIHR, “Russian Federation. Elections to the State Duma 4 December 2011. Also OSCE/ODIHR Election Observation Mission. Final Report.” Warsaw, January 12,2012.

46. For one discussion of the role of social media, see White, Stephen and McAllister, Ian, “Did Russia (Nearly) Have a Facebook Revolution in 2011? Social Media’s Challenge to Authoritarianism,” Politics 34, no. 4, (February 2014): 72–84 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Also see Oates, Sarah, Revolution Stalled: The Political Limits of the Internet in the Post-Soviet Sphere (Oxford, 2013)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

47. For a study of this in the 2007 election, see White, Stephen, “Elections Russian-Style,” Europe-Asia Studies 63, 4, (May 2011): 531-56CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

48. See the comments in OSCE/ODIHR, Russian Federation.

49. Gel’man, Cracks in the Wall, 7; Shevtsova, Implosion, Atrophy, or Revolution?, 22; Bader, Max, “Crowdsourcing election monitoring in the 2011-2012 Russian elections,” East European Politics 29, no. 4, (September, 2013): 521–535 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Bode, Nicole and Makarychev, Andrey, “The New Social Media in Russia: Political Blogging by the Government and the Opposition,” Problems of Post-Communism 60, no. 4, (2013): 53–62 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

50. Nocetti, Julien, “‘Digital Kremlin’: Power and the Internet in Russia,” Russie. Nei. Visions No. 59, April 2011, 5 Google Scholar. For some figures on the scale of use of social networking sites, see White and McAllister, Did Russia (Nearly) Have a Facebook Revolution.

51. On this, see Oates, Revolution Stalled, ch.5.

52. At the same time, 36 per cent believed that UR was a party of crooks and thieves while 45 per cent believed that it was not. Russian Public Opinion, 177.

53. Bader, Crowdsourcing election monitoring.

54. Krastev and Holmes, An Autopsy of Managed Democracy, 42.

55. In the view of many, this was less a concession than a means of attempting to weaken the opposition by enabling the emergence of large numbers of micro-parties.

56. For example, Greene, Samuel A., “Beyond Bolotnaia: Bridging Old and New in Russia’s Election Protest Movement,” Problems of Post-Communism 60, no. 4, (March-April 2013): 40–52 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Popescu, Nicu, “The Strange Alliance of Democrats and Nationalists,” Journal of Democracy 23, no. 4, (July 2012): 46–54 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

57. Ultimately social media could not compensate for organizational weakness, as claimed by Krastev and Holmes, An Autopsy of Managed Democracy, 42.

58. For discussion of how the situation in Russia differed from those in the countries experiencing a color revolution, see Finkel, Evgeny and Brudney, Yitzhak M., “Russia and the colour revolutions,” Democratization 19, no. 4, (February 2012): 15–36 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Stoner-Weiss, Kathryn, “Comparing Oranges and Apples: The Internal and External Dimensions of Russia’s Turn away from Democracy,” in Bunce, Valerie, McFaul, Michael and Stoner-Weiss, Kathryn eds. Democracy and Authoritarianism in the Postcommunist World (Cambridge, Eng., 2010), 255-69Google Scholar; and White and McAllister, Did Russia (Nearly) Have a Facebook Revolution.

59. Where the protest may prefigure problems is in the predominantly middle-class nature of the protesters. If the regime were to find its position eroded among this growing section of the population, it would augur ill for its social base.

60. Gel’man, Cracks in the Wall, 9. The “strategic errors” he notes are an over-estimation of the efficiency of “virtual politics” (as described by Wilson, Andrew, Virtual Politics: Faking Democracy in the Post-Soviet World (New Haven, 2005)Google Scholar), an over-concentration on “decorating the facades” of the system, and a failure to take seriously the risk of returning Putin to the presidency.

61. Permitting him to participate in the September 2013 election for the position о Moscow mayor, in which he came second with 27.24 per cent of the vote, may also have been designed to undercut his position by showing the limits of his electoral support.

62. Although under the impact of the Ukrainian crisis of 2014, Putin’s approval levels rose and once again exceeded 80 percent. The Moscow Times May 29,2014, citing a Levada Center poll.

63. On this, see Sakwa, Richard, The Crisis of Russian Democracy: The Dual State, Factionalism and the Medvedev Succession (Cambridge, Eng., 2011)Google Scholar.

64. Pertsev, Andrei and Surnacheva, Elizabeta. “Moskva-liubitel’skaya: Komu nuzhny praimeriz pered vyborami v Mosgordumu,” Vlast’ 19 (1074), May 19, 2014, 32–35 Google Scholar.

65. Although this was not the only reason for these personnel changes. “Putin Purging Elites Through Medvedev-Pundits,” RIANovosti May 4, 2012 at http://www.en.ria.ru/analysis/20120504/173224562.html (last accessed January 13, 2016).

66. Reuter, Regional patrons and hegemonic party.

67. On the results see Olga Doronina, “No change after political reform,” Russia Beyond the Headlines, October 18, 2012 at http://rbth.com/articles/2012/10/18/no_change_after_political_reform_19227.html (last accessed January 13, 2016).