Tev D. Spikery regional'nykh zakonodatel'nykh sobraniy: kar'yernyye puti i kanaly rekrutirovaniya [Speakers of regional legislatures: career routes and recruitment channels]. Vlast’ i elity [Power and Elites], 2021, 8 (1): 28-65. (in Russian)

Abstract

The article examines the channels for recruitment the speakers of the legislatures of the subjects of the Russian Federation and the features of their career, both before election and after leaving office. The empirical basis of the study is the biographical database of the chairmen of regional legislative assemblies of all convocations after the end of the term of the last councils of people's deputies and until February 2019. It has been established that the speakers are strongly rooted in the bodies of political-administrative power of Soviet society, although the share of the nomenklatura, first of all, party cadres have a pronounced tendency to decrease. The main channel for recruitment of speakers and their place of work after resignation are the representative authorities, primarily regional legislatures. The election of speakers from among relatively experienced professional deputies may indicate a certain autonomization and institutionalization of legislative assemblies. However, this tendency is rather limited: close ties with influential external forces (administrative, economic) that control the legislature can act as a “pulling” factor in legislative careers, freeing speakers from the need for preliminary political “apprenticeship” in parliament. Administrative bodies, primarily regional and local, are an important channel for recruitment of speakers, which, in many respects, reflects the dependence of the formation and functioning of legislatures on governors, who strive to put people from their clientele at the head of them. Speakers are much less likely to work in administrative structures after their resignation, primarily as governor, and the practice of recruiting them for this position was most widespread in the 1990s. Business is a significant source of recruitment of speakers, however, there are relatively few direct descendants from commercial organizations (most often from large by regional standards), which may reflect both the importance of preliminary political professionalization to achieve this post, and control over legislative assemblies by governors, for whom private businessmen may seem too independent to be a speaker. Less often, speakers are engaged in business after leaving office, including their return to the companies in which they worked before the election.