Regional parliamentary experience by example of State Duma of Tomsk Region (1994-2001)

After the Soviet system was abolished a necessity to form new power institutions in the subjects of the federation appeared. These new bodies were supposed to be built on principles of federalism and parliamentarism. Only general framework of regional electoral campaign and basic principles of functioning of parliamentary institutions was established on the federal level so the creation of rules regulating that field in different regions was very active. Parliamentary regulations in the subjects of the Russian Federation were similar to each other in their general concepts but had some regional features. The State Duma of Tomsk Region consisted of 21 deputies elected in single-member districts under majority system. By the elections of December 21, 1997 electoral districts became binomial. Political organizations, representatives of industry, science and education participated in the election to the first and the second Dumas of Tomsk Region (March 27, 1994 and December 21, 1997). Political parties were relatively passive and their performance was not very successful. It seems that one of the reasons political organizations had rather poor results at regional election is that electorate tends to be not ideologically but pragmatically oriented voting for regional power bodies. As a consequence the major part of elected deputies were representatives of industrial organizations and executive power institutions. There were a lot of positive results of the Duma's activity (1994-2001): it was able to create basic laws in different fields of economic, political and social life, which was a big achievement considering that deputies started their work in an almost complete legal vacuum. The basic directions of further work were developed; the deputies managed to pass The Statute of Tomsk Region on July 26, 1995. The turnout at the election of 1997 was higher than in 1994 which showed the increase of the Duma's political influence. However, some negative trends could be displayed as well. Creation of the law was still behind the real life demands, some very important legal rules (for example, in economic field) were not created; most of the acts passed by the Duma were initiated by region executive institutions; participation of the representatives of economic and political elite in the electoral campaign made it more difficult for less wealthy candidates to get into the Duma; voters rarely participated in discussions of bills. Nevertheless, the important thing is that regional parliament was formed, it was able to create and pass laws that were essential for the whole region and the Duma became an important part of regional political system.

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