Subjects of the nomination in Ukraine: legal aspects

The article dwells on the problem of nomination in Ukraine as an important constituent part of democratic and alternative nature of elections. The authors highlight the issue of nomination as  defining a range of subjects which are able to nominate candidates for holding office in authoritative bodies. Evolution of the legal regulation of the issue of nomination subjects in Ukraine is shown based on analysis of the national electoral legislation. Taking into account the fact that subjects of nomination are different according to the type of elections and electoral systems, legal analysis of both, the electoral legislation of Ukraine regulating conduction of Parliamentary elections and the electoral legislation which is basic for electing the head of the state, is conducted separately.

Authors prove that the Ukrainian electoral legislation at initial stages of independence allowed existance of of quite a wide range of nomination subjects which, along with the ones traditional for  international electoral practices, included labor groups, community organisations, etc. This was indicative of the influence traditions of the Soviet elctoral legislation have on the legislation process in Ukraine. At the same time, at the modern stage, the issue of nomination subjects is mainly regulated properly by the national legislation and meets world standards, i.e. subjects of the nomination are political parties, as well as a candidate him/herself (the procedure of selfnomination).

Drawbacks of the national legislation on nomination subjects are as follows: absence of a procedure for nomination of candidates by meetings of voters does not fully substitute the procedure of self-nomination and, to some extent, restricts fulfillment of passive suffrage; absense of requirenments to political parties as nomination subjects allws malversation creating artificial political parties for a specific election campaign; if the system of proportional representation is reestablished in Ukraine, we will have party qualification restricting possiblities for fulfillment of the passive suffrage.