The Committee on Political Technologies of the Russian Association for Public Relations presented the study “Women-deputies in Russian politics: a generalized portrait”

The Committee on Political Technologies of the Russian Association for Public Relations (RASO) on Monday presented the study “Women-deputies in Russian politics: a generalized portrait.” From it it turned out that United Russia, as a rule, is represented by “powerful teachers”, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation – “experienced activists”, “A Just Russia – For Truth” – “experienced apparatchiks”, and “New People” – “young and free businessmen”. -woman. True, women are still rarely in the first roles, yielding them to men, but they often take on administrative functions within the framework of state and municipal government.

The study commissioned by the political technologies committee of the RASO was conducted by political consultants Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and Anton Timchenko. At its presentation, the head of the committee, Yevgenia Stulova, immediately explained that the task of building an attractive image of a female candidate in fact turns out to be quite difficult for a political strategist: “They will always find something to bite you for … A blonde is bad, a brunette is even worse.” As an example, Mrs. Stulova cited the words of her friend, who occupies a fairly high position in one of the power structures, who complained: I will write about the party – everyone who does not like the party unsubscribes, I show pots – they will definitely say that the pan is expensive …

As part of their study (available to Kommersant), political technologists analyzed portraits of women from five parliamentary parties who have mandates of deputies of the State Duma and regional legislative assemblies, as well as holding the posts of senators.

The researchers described the generalized representative of United Russia as a “powerful teacher”. “As a rule, this is a woman representing generation X (average – 53 years old), blonde, with a pedagogical background. As a rule, she is married. However, up to a third of them seeks not to publish information about their marital status,” explained Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. The RASO also noted that, as a rule, United Russia women have two higher educations or an academic degree.

A typical female politician from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation was described by experts as an “experienced activist.” As indicated in the study, most communist women with a parliamentary mandate were self-employed (entrepreneurs, lawyers) or even pensioners in the past, but their professional activities, as a rule, were combined with active political work in the party or as an assistant to a deputy. At the federal level, there are more blondes among communists, while at the regional level there are more blonde hair. At the same time, they are the most open in terms of publishing information about marital status, and among them there are more representatives of the technical intelligentsia than in other parties, although the predominant higher education is in the humanities.

The women of A Just Russia – For Truth were dubbed “experienced apparatchiks” by experts. “The main personnel “trampoline” in the corridors of legislative power is work in the party,” the study says. As Mrs. Pavlyuchenkova explained, women-SRs often come to the legislature from the positions of heads of regional party branches. And their average portrait is a married woman of 56 years old with blond hair.

The LDPR is represented in the parliaments by “responsible state employees”. As the authors of the study found out, women in this party often have a background similar to the representatives of the United Russia: before their political career, they usually worked as doctors or teachers. Like United Russia, the Liberal Democrats prefer to hide information about their marital status, and their average age is 49 years. At the same time, the RASO noted that there are no women in the Duma faction of the LDPR.

Finally, the typical woman from the New People party is “a businesswoman – young and free.” As a rule, these politicians are noticeably younger than their counterparts from other parties (the average age is 35 years old) and, also unlike their rival colleagues, are usually brown-haired and not married. In addition, “New People” is the leader in recruiting to the legislature “Generation Y (born 1983-2003.— “b”),” the experts said.

During the meeting, political strategist Sergei Starovoitov presented his data, according to which, on average, women make up 15-18% of the deputies in regional councils and city dumas. Although there are exceptions: for example, in Chukotka there are 53% of women parliamentarians, and not a single one in the parliament of Chechnya. However, according to Mr. Starovoitov, this is just the tip of the iceberg, since women are much more represented in state and municipal government bodies, albeit more often in secondary roles – in the role of deputy heads and in lower positions. Men usually carry out representational functions and are engaged in “strategy”, while women more often take on the administrative part of the work, the expert added.

Political strategist Dmitry Zinoviev, in turn, said that, judging by his research, even hairstyle and hair color play an important role for women politicians. So, according to his survey, the majority of respondents would like to see a woman with short dark hair as a municipal deputy. And RASO President Yevgeny Minchenko shared another important conclusion: if a male politician in the image of a warrior has a fist as the center of power, then a woman has a forehead. And he strongly advised all interested parties to take this circumstance into account when forming the image of a politician.

Andrey Vinokurov