The arrest of the Russian minister Ulyukaev drew wide response, however many Russians still think that anti-corruption measures are insufficient.

MOSCOW, November 25, 2016.  Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) presents the data of the survey devoted to Russian assessments of the arrest of the former minister of economic development Aleksey Ulyukaev, as well as their assessments of the effectiveness of anti-corruption measures in the country.

The Ulyukaev’s arrest drew wide response in the Russian society: according to the recent data, more than three-quarters of Russians are aware of the arrest (78%). Elderly persons, Russians with high level of education are more informed compared to young Russians or persons who have secondary education diplomas.

The Medialogia Company has carried out an analysis of the media publications about A. Ulyukaev since January 2016. Over this period there have been 116 thousand publications in the Russian media; most of mentions are published in November 2016 (30 thousand). The media reported on the arrest of A. Ulyukaev and him being dismissed as the head of the Ministry of Economic Development.

Russians tend to consider his arrest as a meaningful action or political point-scoring (54%) rather than a manifestation of fight against bribery (30%).

Simultaneously, almost half of Russians (46%) see visible results of the authorities’ anti-corruption policies but only 13% think these results are significant, whereas  33% think that the measures are insufficient; they are opposed by  47% (including 22% of those who consider that the situation is deteriorating).  The November indicator is -1 p. (on a scale from -100 to 100); this assessment is lower than the last year, but more positive compared to the 2005-2013 assessments.

* Anti-corruption measures index shows how successful, as Russians think, the anti-corruption measures of the Russian authorities are. The index is based on the question “The country’s leadership constantly strengthens the importance of the fight against corruption. Have you seen any results of this fight, for example over the recent year, or not?”; it is measured in points and can vary between  -100 an 100. The higher the value of index is, the more noticeable the results are.  

The VCIOM survey was conducted on November 29-30, 2016, in 130 settlements, 46 regions and 8 federal districts of Russia. Sample size was 1600 persons. The survey was conducted with multi-stage stratified sample based on general rule of walking and quotas at the final selection stage; the sample is representative of the Russian population aged 18 and over according to sex, age, education, type of settlement.  The margin of error (taking into account the design effect) with 95% confidence interval does not exceed 3.5%. The survey method is community-based structured face-to-face interviews. Apart from the margin of error, minor changes in question wording and different circumstances arising during the field work should be taken into account.

The monitoring and analysis of the Russian media was carried out by the Medialogia Company using the Medialogia database involving 35100 sources such as television, radio, newspapers, information agencies and online media. The period of study was from January through November 2016.  

Note: Using materials from the site www.wciom.ru or wciom.com, as well as distributed by VCIOM, the reference to the source (or hyperlink for the electronic media) is obligatory! Full or partial reproduction of the Medialogia Company materials in other media must contain a reference to the Medialogia Company.