PARTY DISCIPLINE OF THE RUSSIAN STATE DUMA DEPUTIES: ELECTORAL SYSTEM FACTOR

Institutional factors are important when considering deputies' legislative behavior. The main explanatory mechanism is the theory of competing principals, which suggests that deputies behave differently depending on the type of electoral system under which they are elected to parliament. The article analyzes party discipline of Russian State Duma deputies during the VI and VII convocations based on roll call vote data. Previous studies of party discipline in the Russian parliament have been inconclusive. Contemporary work has focused on non-institutional factors. The main question of the article is whether institutional factors such as the type of electoral system affect the legislative behavior of deputies in the Russian State Duma. The act of 2014, which changed the type of electoral system from fully proportional to mixed, is a natural experiment that provides an opportunity to use the difference-in-difference (DiD) method of analysis. The use of quasi-experimental design allows us to move from describing relationships to making reasonable assumptions about causal links. The study's findings indicate that deputies elected in single-mandate districts demonstrate less party discipline than deputies elected through party lists. The results provide a basis for formulating and testing more complex hypotheses to improve knowledge of what institutional factors influence deputies' legislative behavior in the modern Russian parliament.