Karelian Single-Industry Towns Vote on the Constitutional Amendments in 2020: An Individual Case Analysis

In: State power and local self-government, Band 11, S. 46-50

Abstract

In the article questions of voting of one-company towns of the Republic of Karelia on amendments to the Constitution of the Russian Federation are investigated in the summer of 2020. The interest of the appeal to a single case is caused by low values of electoral turnout in the region. The analysis of the results of the referendum in single-profile municipalities of the Republic is due to low socio-economic indicators in comparison with the rest of the Russian Federation. The paper contains a table that provides information on the percentage of voter turnout and the distribution of responses to constitutional amendments for each polling station in 11 single-industry towns in Karelia. The study identified two groups of factors that influenced the results of the constitutional referendum in single-industry municipalities in the region. The first category included circumstances that are typical for all regions of the Russian Federation: psychological fatigue from information about the COVID-19 pandemic and the postponement of voting for the summer vacation period. The second included specific indicators typical of Karelian single-industry towns: the combination of elements of patriarchal and national political culture in the practice of electoral participation, the geographical location of singleindustry towns on the territory of the Republic, their distance from the center and proximity to European borders.