When it works: In 2020, Tomsk was the only place in Russia where ‘Smart Vote’ propelled candidates to a city-council majority. Here’s what happened in the year that followed.

During the 2020 Tomsk City Duma election, candidates endorsed by Team Navalny's "Smart Vote" initiative won unequivocally. Despite the fact that most of them were previously little-known, Smart Vote-backed candidates won 19 out of the 27 single-mandate constituencies, while candidates from the ruling party, United Russia, won 11 out of 37 seats in the Tomsk City Duma overall. For comparison, in the same electoral race in 2015, United Russia won in 25 constituencies and received 30 seats in the Duma. On the eve of the 2021 elections to the Tomsk City and Regional Dumas, Meduza special correspondent Andrey Pertsev traveled to Tomsk to see how the results of last year's election changed the city's political situation. There, he discovered that the Communist Party had begun using bolder slogans and nominating younger candidates, while United Russia took a new approach, interacting more with voters and even venturing into social media. Meanwhile, the opposition candidates ultimately failed to coordinate on any joint action. Original Article: https://meduza.io/en/feature/2021/09/21/when-it-works