Russian legislative election, 2007

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Legislative elections will be held in the Russian Federation on December 2, 2007^[1]. At stake are the 450 seats in the State Duma (Gosudarstvennaya Duma), the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia (The legislature).

The 2007 election will be assigned exclusively from party-list proportional representation under a law adopted in 2005 on the initiative of President Vladimir Putin. He claimed it would strengthen the party system by reducing the number of parties in the Duma. In the previous elections half of the seats were filled using proportional representation and another half using the first-past-the-post system.

As of 2007, the 225 single-member districts are abolished. In the election of 2003, 100 of these seats were won by independents or minor party candidates. All seats will be awarded by proportional representation. The threshold for eligibility to win seats has been raised from 5.0 to 7.0 percent. In 2003 four parties each exceeded 7.0 percent of the list vote and collectively won 70.7 percent of the total Duma vote.

Only officially registered parties may compete, and registered parties cannot form a bloc in order to improve their chances of clearing the 7.0 percent threshold, with the provision that parties in the Duma must represent at least 60% of the participating citizens.^[2]. Full list of registered parties. Duma seats are allocated to individuals on the lists of successful parties in accordance with their ranking there. Any members who resign from their party automatically forfeit their seats.