Generation of the 2000’s: political accountability under the economic crisis
Keywords:
generation, survey experiment, political accountability, economic crisis, annexation of CrimeaAbstract
Should one blame authorities for the economic crisis? What is the role of patriotic sentiments triggered by the annexation of Crimea in assessing the effectiveness of the key governing bodies in Russia? When the two contradictory effects are in the full play – one being the economic crisis, which questions the effectiveness of the public authorities, and the other being the “rally ‘round the flag” effect triggered by annexation of Crimea and boosting support for the authorities – which will be the resulting vector in assessing the authorities? In this paper, based on a survey experiment conducted with the participation of students from Moscow, Saint Petersburg, and Perm, we have investigated how these contradictory effects shape students’ strategy of the attribution of responsibility to the key governing bodies in Russia. Given that modern students have always lived under the leadership of President Putin and during the time when there has been no rotation of top political elites, will they be ready to attribute responsibility for bad governance (economic crisis) or good governance (annexation of Crimea) to the top ruling authorities? We have found that students are ready to blame top authorities only if they disagree with the annexation of Crimea coupled with perceiving the economic crisis, while the negative effect from this combination of factors on the president’s rating is the strongest. DOI: 10.17072/2218-1067-2016-4-44-65References
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