Searching for the Electoral Connection: Parliamentary Party Switching in the Ukrainian Rada, 1998-2002

Abstract

Studies of legislative behavior almost universally begin with the assumption that legislators desire reelection. For those who study the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada, this assumption is, perhaps, tenuous given the weaknesses of political parties and the significant party switching. Yet, an analysis of party switching between 1998 and 2002, using a new method that controls for selection bias, demonstrates that while turnover amongst parties was high, this turnover followed an electoral logic: deputies changed parties, in part, based on an electoral logic. Thus, the electoral connection, assumed in so much of the legislative behavior literature, existed even in the chaotic Rada.

Keywords: Rada, Ukraine, Party Switching