Yearly Archive: 2001

BULLETINS “IISEPS NEWS” N 4 (22) DECEMBER

IISEPS News, N 4 (22), 2001 Content: Preface Belarus: Prospects in the XXI Century: Results of a national public opinion poll Open Forum: Dr. Hans-Georg Wieck, Ambassador, Head of the OSCE Advisory and Monitoring Group in Belarus OSCE Advisory and Monitoring Group in Belarus: Accoplishments and Failures Pavel Severinets, Leader of the Youth Front Delayed-action …

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ELITE FEAR THE LOSE OF SOVEREIGNTY ADN NOT BELIEVE LIBERAKISATION

Judging by the answers received (see Table 1), at present, according to leaders and experts, Belarus faces three the most important tasks. They are: reforming economy, retaining state sovereignty and society democratization (in fact, employees of the private sector placed “retaining sovereignty” first). That means that ten years after gaining independence Belarus is still at an initial stage of creating an independent state, still faces problems that have not lost their actuality.

ELITE WELCOMES V. PUTIN’S STEPS TOWARDS THE WEST AND FEELS COOLNESS IN RUSSIAN-BELARUSIAN RELATIONS

Unlike the whole population, elite is much more reserved towards Russia. Less than one fourth of pollees said a union of two states is the best variant of bilateral relations, and less than 3% spoke in favor of unification into one state (see Table 1). Differences in approaches of representatives of state and non-state structures are obvious – the latter view Russia as a common neighbor (though employees of the public sector must have more fears towards a close integration as a potential threat for their status). However, the matter is how it is possible to enlist voters’ trust having such views, because voters mainly think in a different way.

PROBLEMS OF THE OPPOSITION BY ELITE’S EYES

Only three months have past since the presidential election and all passions raging around the event have suddenly abated. Regardless of the fact that independent monitoring over the voting process, and then the majority of non-state researches registered a great number of election law violations and an unprecedented falsification of the voting returns, all seem to accept the election results and Belarus’ society fell into habitual hibernation. What is the opposition up to, what are the former contenders for presidency doing, what are well known politologists talking about, if it is less and less reflected in Belarusian press?

SOCIETY’S REACTION TO FUTURE REVISION OF EASTERN COURSE

A decrease in number of supporters of integration spotted in two previous surveys continues in October, though a little slower than in August (see Table 1). As a result, over the last two years the number of opponents of integration has exceeded the number of supporters. It mainly resulted from the fact that the number of respondents who consider unification into a single state the best variant of bilateral relations dropped (see Table 2). But we should mention here that the number of those who consider good friendly relations of two independent states an optimal variant did not go up, whereas the ranks of advocates of a union of sovereign states crept up 5%.

MOST OF THOSE WHO VOTED FOR A. LUKASHENKO FELT NO INFORMATION SHORTAGE

Back in August, as we know from IISEPS data, almost two thirds of respondents said they have no enough information about each candidate for presidency (see Table 1). More than 40% of them were going to vote for A. Luakshenko (see Table 2). However, among all supporters of A. Lukashenko the ratio of those well-informed was two times higher than among all voters. That means that to some degree the parliamentary election scenario recurred, when a considerable part of the population voted having no proper information, but in line with their political-ideological preferences. What could be said about information availability at the presidential election, and how information knowledge is related to personal choice of voters?

SOCIAL-DEMOGRAPHIC AND REGIONAL ASPECTS OF THE PAST PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN

It is no secret that representatives of different social-demographic groups of the population have differing political (and not only political) opinions. It is quite evident from the results of the October national opinion poll by IISEPS, presented in the context of major social-demographic and regional characteristics. For example, this data* shows (See Tables 1-6), that women turned most active in the voting process (87.3%), pensioners (90.7%) and representatives of senior age groups (aged 40–49 – 86.2%, aged 50–59 – 89.7%, 60 and up – 91.0%). Residents of Grodno (87.6%) and Gomel (88.6%) regions as well as rural population were the most active.

POPULATION’S OPINION OF THE PAST PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN

Another IISEPS’s national public opinion poll was conducted four weeks after the voting, results of which, announced by the Central Election Commission, caused a very conflicting reaction by different population groups. With complete approval of their supporters Belarus’ authorities announced an “elegant victory”, the opposition leaders claimed there was an unprecedented falsification of results, influential foreign organizations and leadership of most of western countries said the election did not correspond to international standards. But who is right? Let’s consider the October opinion poll’s results from this standpoint. In some cases we would use results of previous sociological procedures conducted by IISEPS.

NATIONAL POLL 10’01

1. Title of the study: Belarus: prospects in the XXI century”.
2. Topics of thematic coverage: political, social and economic factors of transformations of Belarusian society, preparation to presidential elections.
3. The aim: to study the most important facilitators and obstacles of development of Belarusian society, to support Belarusian democratic forces for social transformations
4. Descriptors: market, economic attitudes, socio-political positions and attitudes, integration, free and democratic election, electoral behavior, opposition, political preferences, political parties, mass media
5. Comparability: most important questions were replicated
6. Geographical area: Belarus-national
7. Principal investigator: IISEPS
8. Polling organization: IISEPS, P.O.B. 219, Minsk, 220030, Belarus, e-mail: iiseps@iiseps.org
9. Fieldwork dates: 2001, October
10. Population sampled: 18+ years old residents of Belarus who are not currently in hospital, jail, military service
11. Sampling: clustered random
12. Sample size: 1465 respondents
13. Mode of interviews: face-to-face interview
14. Interviewers: part-time and university students
15. Control: selective control of interviewers
16. Related publications: more then 10 publications in mass media
17. Availability of the original data sets: contact with IISEPS
18. Source of information: IISEPS

 

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT TENDENCIES IN 2001: POPULATION’S OPINION

Accumulation of positive estimations regarding different social-economic factors has been a distinguishing feature of dynamics of population’s economic visions in the current year. To put it other way, there is a certain growth of public satisfaction with economic situation. It is proved practically by all traditional indicators which IISEPS applies to monitor economic perceptions of our fellow citizens (see Tables 1–5). Although most of the indicators still gravitate towards negative estimation, a positive dynamics is evident.