Public expectations ahead of Russia’s parliamentary elections this month are, reading between the lines, low.
For many, the elections to the State Duma seem to have little bearing on what comes next. But while an opposition politician can respond by revealing evidence of election manipulation designed to reduce people’s interest in the vote, it falls to sociologists – of which I am one – to analyse and often criticise how the public opinion data was collected in the first place.
Alas, the basic tools used by Russian sociologists are imperfect even for measuring superficial public opinion – let alone capturing public sentiment.
