Electoral Rules and Legislative Parties in the Ukrainian Rada

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/lsq.12105
• Date: 01 February 2016
• Author: Frank Thames
• Published date: 01 February 2016

FRANK THAMES

Texas Tech University

Electoral Rules and Legislative

Parties in the Ukrainian Rada

Critics of Ukraine’s single-member district majoritarian and mixed-member

majoritarian electoral systems argue that they undermined the efficiency of the Supreme

Rada by permitting nonpartisan single-member district deputies to enter the legislature

in large numbers. Such deputies changed parties and ignored party positions. This article

argues that the effect of the differences in how legislators are elected is dependent upon

whether legislators are partisans. The statistical analysis of party switching and party

cohesion in the Rada from 1998 to 2002 shows that nonpartisan single-member district

deputies were the most likely to switch parties and the least cohesive.

In 1998, Ukraine’s legislature, the Supreme Rada, voted to replace

the single-member district (SMD) majoritarian electoral system with a

mixed-member majoritarian (MMM) system.

1

While the motivations

behind Ukraine’s electoral reforms are many (Herron 2007), some justi-

f‌ied reform based on the negative consequences created by electoral

system and the f‌luidity of partisanship in the chamber. During one f‌loor

debate, Valerii Mishura, member of the Communist Party of Ukraine,

linked the weakness of the Rada directly to its large number of nonparti-

san members, the majority of whom were elected in the SMD tier:

You can agree or disagree with the program of a party, but for every voter it is clear

what the party wants...We have a large percentage of non-party [members]—a huge

swamp, which can sink any cow even a sacred one. This should not be. (Verkhovna

Rada 1997b)

For critics of the SMD system, these nonpartisan deputies who

lacked any electoral connection to their legislative party undermined the

effective operation of the Rada itself (Verkhovna Rada 1997a, 1997d).

With so many nonpartisan deputies, it was more diff‌icult to pass legisla-

tion, negotiate agreements among parties, and f‌ind solutions to legislative

disagreements. In fact, party leaders often failed to obtain consistent sup-

port on their positions among members of their own parties. Thus, critics

of the system preferred a closed-list proportional-representation (PR)

system that would create stronger, better organized legislative parties.

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LEGISLATIVE STUDIES QUARTERLY, 41, 1, February 2016 35

DOI: 10.1111/lsq.12105

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C2016 Washington University in St. Louis

The debate within the Rada over the impact of electoral rules on

the behavior of legislators mirrors a debate within the comparative legis-

lative literature on the legislative impact of mixed-member systems.

There is signif‌icant variation in the rules that govern mixed-member

systems across different cases; however, at their core, all mixed-member

systems combine a list election, for example, closed-list PR, with a

majoritarian election, for example, SMD plurality. The different incen-

tives for legislative behavior created by these divergent electoral systems

spawned a number of studies seeking to f‌ind evidence of divisions

within the behavior of legislators in these systems (e.g., Heller and

Mershon 2005; Herron 2002; Lancaster and Patterson 1990; Morlang

2004; Smith and Remington 2001; Stoffel 2014; Stratmann and Baur

2002; Thames 2001, 2005a).While there is a signif‌icant amount of

research on this topic, it has not reached a def‌initive conclusion on

whether the presence of legislators elected by different electoral rules,

leads to differences in legislative behavior in mixed-member systems.

This article attempts to add to this broader debate by understanding

better how partisanship impacts electoral incentives. I argue that

electoral incentives interact with partisanship to shape legislators’ rela-

tionships to their parties. To test this argument, I analyze patterns of

party switching and party cohesion in the f‌irst Ukrainian Rada elected by

the new MMM system. This period covers the 3rd convocation of the

Rada from 1998 to 2002. The empirical analysis demonstrates that the

impact of electoral rules depended upon the partisanship of Rada

deputies.

The article will proceed as follows. First, I review the existing liter-

ature of electoral systems and legislative behavior. Here, I will develop

my argument and state my hypotheses. Second, I will discuss the specif-

ics of the Ukrainian case. At this point, I will explain why the Ukrainian

cases are useful for testing the arguments made here. Third, my empirical

analysis will examine the determinants of party switching and party

cohesion in the Rada’s 3rd convocation. Finally, I conclude with a dis-

cussion of the implications of these f‌indings.

Legislators, Electoral Systems, and Parties

Political parties are institutions common to legislatures across

many different contexts. The legislative research on parties argues that

legislators, in part, create them to solve two specif‌ic problems—legislat-

ing and reelection. First, parties are central to the legislative process

because they allow legislators to overcome obstacles to collective action.

Cox and McCubbins argue that without some form of organization,

36 Frank Thames