The American pride in democracy is evident in the election season. Coming from Russia, I get constant reminders of my former country’s inferiority. But I’ve seen the electoral systems of both, and harbor no illusions about either.
Growing up in Russia, I got used to the fact that elections are not necessarily a democratic issue. Because even as the will of the people is expressed, the deals between parties guarding their own interests make the calls. After all, the history of the 1996 elections, which Gennady Zyuganov, the leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF), is purported to have won (with multiple accounts backing those claims) but conceded to Yeltsin, haunts the post-Soviet space. I don’t identify with my homeland’s ruling party, and rarely see any politicians in Russia fully align with my views.
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