Article

Unifying the Concepts of Electoral Fraud and Preference Falsification: Case of Russia

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Abstract

This study throws new light on whether public opinion polls, namely, preference falsification, can affect the level of election fraud by employing Kuran's model of preference falsification, which is empirically tested using the data collected from the most recent presidential campaign in Russia (2012). My research findings reveal the presence of statistically significant effects of preference falsification on election fraud, thus enabling me to conclude that preference falsification is, indeed, conducive to election fraud. My findings are generalizable to a broad set of authoritarian regimes, enabling scholars to get a better understanding of the mechanism by which survey polls can incentivize offi�cials to commit election fraud. Hopefully, these findings will also invite more interdisciplinary research within the�fields of election forensics and survey methodology.

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... Timur Kuran (1991) famously introduced the concept of preference falsification, referring to political pressure forcing people to make public statements that are contrary to their private beliefs. Some research found that systematic survey response errors are present in Russian public opinion polls (Kalinin 2013). Other recent works on Russian polling practices revealed a high level of reliability of survey responses in Russia (Frye et al. 2017). ...
... In the same period, the attitude towards Ukraine was considerably more positive than to Georgia. The most positive assessments were recorded in 2003-04 and again in 2013, with more than 70% of -2018) and Foreign Policy Concepts (2000, 2013, 2016 Figure 5. Public attitudes towards Ukraine, Georgia andBelarus (1997-2018) Russians feeling positive about Ukraine. The 2014 events in Ukraine profoundly changed the situation: the attitude towards Ukraine sharply deteriorated, reaching a historic low in March 2016 (25% positive and 64% negative), while the perception of Georgia continued to improve, reaching a historic high in November 2015 (59% positive and 17% negative). ...
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