Presidential elections were held in Russia on 16 June 1996, with a second round being held on 3 July 1996. It resulted in a victory for the incumbent Russian president Boris Yeltsin, who ran as an independent politician. Yeltsin defeated the Communist Party of the Russian Federation challenger Gennady Zyuganov in the second round, receiving 54.4% of the vote. Yeltsin's second inauguration ceremony took place on 9 August 1996.
Yeltsin would not complete the second term for which he was elected, as he resigned on 31 December 1999, eight months before the scheduled end of his term on 9 August 2000; he was succeeded by his chosen successor, Vladimir Putin, whom he had appointed prime minister of Russia a few months earlier. This was the first presidential election to take place in post-Soviet Russia. As of 2024, this has also been the only Russian presidential election in which no candidate was able to win on the first round, and as such a runoff election was necessary.
Although most contemporaneous reports certified the 1996 election result, the election has been associated with various counts of pro-Yeltsin media bias and foreign influence, as well as allegations of electoral fraud or that it was an unfair election. Critics also argued that Yeltsin had engaged in vote buying by utilizing state finances to fund social programs, to which he responded he was merely doing his duties as president. Others argued that the allegations were exaggerated, and that the then United States government in fact refrained from covert operations and did not grant all of Yeltsin's requests.
Background
In 1991, Boris Yeltsin was elected to a five-year term as president of Russia, which was still a part of the Soviet Union at the time. The next election was scheduled to be held sometime in 1996. In late December 1991, Soviet Russia became a sovereign nation in wake of the dissolution of the Soviet Union. This meant that the scheduled election would now be the first ever presidential election to be held in a fully sovereign Russia.
In a 1993 Russian government referendum question (III), Russian voters rejected holding an early presidential election, and the presidential election remained scheduled to be held in the year 1996. Later in 1993, the Constitution of Russia was adopted. In the constitution, future presidential terms were stipulated to last for four years, meaning that the 1996 election would elect a president to serve a four-year term. When incumbent president Yeltsin launched his re-election campaign in early 1996, he was widely predicted to lose. Public opinion of Yeltsin was at a historical low point. Due to this, there was talk about Yeltsin potentially postponing or canceling the election; he ultimately decided against this.
Shortly before the election campaign, Yeltsin had faced a number of significant political humiliations which harmed his political stature. In the 1995 Russian legislative election, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF) had achieved dominance in the State Duma. On 9 January 1996, Chechen rebels seized thousands of hostages in Dagestan and Yeltsin's response to this was viewed as a failure. Additionally, Yeltsin presided over an economy that was still contracting, and many workers had continued to be unpaid for months. During 1992 and 1993 Russia experienced hyperinflation that wiped out the savings of most people, and its currency collapsed in 1994.
By early 1996, Yeltsin's public approval was so poor that he was polling at fifth place among presidential candidates, with only 8 percent support, while CPRF leader Gennady Zyuganov was in the lead with 21 percent support. When Zyuganov showed up at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in February 1996, many Western leaders and the international media were eager to see him, and treated him with regards to believing that he would likely be the next president of Russia.
Campaigning
Vladimir Bryntsalov
Pharmaceutical businessman Vladimir Bryntsalov ran as the candidate of the Russian Socialist Party. Brytsalov argued that his leadership would eliminate the country's poverty, promising that if he were elected, there would be "no poor pensioners, no poor workers, no poor entrepreneurs, no poor farmers." His plan, which he dubbed "Russian socialism", was for large companies to begin paying wages comparable to companies in other industrialized nations. The plan anticipated that the employees of the companies would consequentially pay larger income taxes, spend more on consumer goods, and increase their productivity at their jobs. The feasibility of this plan was criticized, as Russian companies were considered to be unable to pay such wages.
Brytsalov promoted himself with the superlative claim of being "the richest man in Russia" and flaunted his wealth. Despite being at the time a recently elected deputy of the State Duma, Brytsalov did not have a voting-record. In his legislative career, he had very low attendance and extremely little participation. Brytsalov was seen as a marginal candidate, and was generally regarded as unlikely to win the election.
Mikhail Gorbachev
Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev ran as an independent candidate. He ran as a self-proclaimed social democrat, and asserted that, of those running for president, his was the voice of responsibility and moderation. His campaign was hampered both by strong public disdain towards him and a strong lack of media coverage for his candidacy. At one point, Gorbachev complained that there was less press freedom than when he was leader of the Soviet Union.
Gorbachev subsequently questioned the validity of the election results. While he acknowledged that he had lost by a significant margin, Gorbachev suspected that his actual vote count still exceeded what was reported in the official tally. In 2017, Gorbachev wrote in his book The New Russia that "there have been no fair and free elections in Russia since those of 1989, 1990 and the election of 1991 when Boris Yeltsin became the first president of Russia."
Svyatoslav Fyodorov
Svyatoslav Fyodorov, a politician and renown ophthalmologist, ran as the candidate of the Party of Workers' Self-Government. He was the founder and leader of the party, which at the time was arguably the most influential social-democratic movement in Russia. Fyodorov was considered to be on the center-left of the political spectrum. In 1994, Fyodorov had described his political objective by stating: "I want peasants to own farms, workers to own factories, physicians to own clinics, and everyone to pay a 30% tax, and the rest is theirs."
Fyodorov advocated for the mass creation of joint stock companies to guarantee workers a share of profits and allow them to actively participate in management of their companies. He dubbed this concept "democratic capitalism" or "popular socialism". He had advocated such a policy since as early as 1991. Fyodorov advocated for economic freedom, simple and moderate taxation, stimulation of production, and a ban on exports of most raw materials. Fyodorov promised that his policies would double the nation's GDP within five years. Fyodorov proclaimed to draw inspiration in his politics from both Ross Perot and Deng Xiaoping. Up until early May 1996, Fyodorov unsuccessfully attempted to negotiate the creation of a third force coalition, with negotiations largely centering on a coalition between him and fellow candidates Yavlinsky and Lebed.
Alexander Lebed
General Alexander Lebed ran as the nominee of the Congress of Russian Communities, a centrist nationalist party. Lebed promoted himself as an authoritative leader that would introduce law and order, tackle corruption, and allow capitalism to blossom. While he presented an authoritarian personality, he held moderate positions. After reaching an informal agreement with Yeltsin in April (under which Lebed promised to endorse Yeltsin in the second round of the election), Lebed began to see positive news coverage, as well as a greater overall quantity of media coverage. This was done as part of an effort by Yeltsin's camp to promote Lebed in the hopes that he would syphon off votes from other nationalist candidates in the first-round. Up until early May 1996, Lebed had entertained negotiations with Yavlinsky and Fyodorov to jointly form a third force coalition.
Martin Shakkum
Martin Shakkum ran as an independent candidate. An associate of radical economist Stanislav Shatalin, Shakkum was on the right wing of the Russian political spectrum. Like Lebed, although he presented himself with an authoritarian personality, he held moderate positions on many social issues.
Aman Tuleyev
Independent candidate Aman Tuleyev, a member of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF), styled himself as a "Muslim Communist". The head of the Kemerovo Oblast legislature, Tuleyev was considered to be charismatic, energetic, and well-liked by the CPRF's political base. Despite the fact that Tuleyev dropped out of the race before the election, he had already been on the ballot during a portion of the early voting period, and he turned-in his signatures the day before the deadline. He was considered to be a fallback CPRF candidate in case Zyuganov's candidacy faltered. Tuleyev's rhetoric straddled between hardline communism and social democracy. Generally a hardliner, he had nonetheless occasionally taken moderate stances, such as seeking tax cuts. Tuleyev's positions centered upon communism and creating a disciplined and uncorrupt government. Tuleyev dropped out of the race on 8 June 1996 and endorsed Zyuganov.
Yury Vlasov
Politician and former Olympic weightlifter Yury Vlasov ran as an independent candidate. His politics were characterized as nationalist. Vlasov openly espoused antisemitic rhetoric. Vlasov dubbed his politics as "people's patriotism". His campaign platform proclaimed: "There is only one single force that is able to unite almost all and at the same time become the ideological basis of the Russian state – popular patriotism." While he had been a supporter of democratic reforms in the Soviet Union, Vlasov had embraced authoritarian political views following its collapse. Vlasov likened his politics to Gaullism. He argued that his politics were a more effective unifying force than communist or liberal-democratic ideals. Although he was nominally an independent candidate, Vlasov's campaign was supported by the People's National Party; by the end of the election, many in the party grew dissatisfied with Vlasov's campaign style, believing he failed to campaign aggressively enough. Despite polling at under one percent, Vlasov had stated that he anticipated capturing between six and seven percent of the vote. He swore to refuse supporting either Yeltsin or support Zyuganov in the runoff.
Grigory Yavlinsky
Grigory Yavlinsky ran as the nominee of Yabloko. Yavlinsky officially accepted Yabloko's nomination on 27 January 1996. In terms of social issues, Yavlinsky occupied the political left. In terms of economic issues, Yavlinsky occupied the far right of the Russian political spectrum. His ideology most strongly appealed to Russia's population of young intellectuals. Yabloko had been a programmatic party, as opposed to a populist one. This proved to be a weakness for Yavlinsky's campaign, as he and his party opted to maintain their long-established party positions on many issues rather than reshaping their agenda in order to better capitalize on the political tides. This had also been the case in the preceding 1995 electoral campaign, during which Yabloko similarly had opted to focus on complex economic issues, rather than focusing on bread and butter issues. Up until early May 1996, Yavlinsky unsuccessfully attempted to negotiate the creation of a third force coalition, with negotiations largely centering on a coalition between him and fellow candidates Lebed and Fyodorov.
Boris Yeltsin
Incumbent Boris Yeltsin ran for re-election as an independent candidate. While his prospects of winning were originally faltering, Yeltsin was able to resuscitate his image and pull off a successful campaign. Yeltsin's original strategy, devised by Oleg Soskovets, involved him pivoting towards the nationalist wing of Russia's politics in order to directly compete for votes with Zyuganov and Zhirinovsky; this strategy was ultimately abandoned in favor of one devised by reformists and British and American consultants. Yeltsin's new campaign strategy was, essentially, to convince voters that they had to choose him as the lesser of two evils. This strategy sought to recast Yeltsin as an individual single-handedly fighting to stave off Communist control. The campaign framed a narrative that portrayed Yeltsin as Russia's best hope for stability. The campaign worked to shift the narrative of the election into a referendum on whether voters wanted to return to their Communist past (with Zyuganov), or continue with reforms (with Yeltsin).