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TheUnion of Right Forces (SPS)[a] was a Russianliberal-conservative[1] political public organization and former party, initially founded as anelectoral bloc in 1999 and associated withfree market reforms,privatization, and the legacy of the "young reformers" of the 1990s:Anatoly Chubais,Boris Nemtsov,Sergey Kiriyenko andYegor Gaidar. The party officially self-dissolved in 2008.Nikita Belykh was the party's last leader from 2005 to 2008.
In 2011, the SPS was refounded by some of its former members as theUnion of Right Forces Movement. In 2012, it was registered as apolitical public organization, a type ofNGO. In Russia, participation inelections requires being accepted into thelist of political parties controlled by the Ministry of Justice.
Both the former SPS and the refounded SPS were accepted as a member of theInternational Democracy Union (IDU).
The SPS was established in 1999, following a merger of several smaller liberal parties, includingDemocratic Choice of Russia andDemocratic Russia. In the1999 parliamentary elections the SPS won 8.6% of the vote and 32 seats in the RussianState Duma (lower house of theFederal Assembly of Russia).[citation needed]
In the 2000 presidential election, the SPS supportedVladimir Putin's candidacy, though many of the party leaders supportedGrigory Yavlinsky. The SPS parliamentarians overwhelmingly voted against reintroducing the Soviet-era national anthem in 2000.[citation needed]
The SPS was led by former Deputy Prime MinisterBoris Nemtsov from 2000 to 2003. During this time SPS strongly opposed what it saw to be theauthoritarian policies of President Vladimir Putin, and argued that political and media freedoms in Russia had been curtailed.[citation needed]
In the2003 parliamentary elections, the SPS, according to official results, received 4% of the vote and failed to cross the 5% threshold necessary for parliamentary representation. In single-mandate constituencies, SPS candidatesPavel Krasheninnikov,Arsen Fadzaev, andAlexey Likhachyov were elected to the State Duma of the fourth convocation (all three moved to theUnited Russia faction).[3][4] State Duma deputyAnton Bakov joined the SPS. A number of SPS candidates came second in single-mandate electoral districts the party had previously held, such asIrina Khakamada inSt. Petersburg,Vladimir V. Kara-Murza inMoscow, orBoris Nadezhdin in theMoscow Oblast. Despite allegations of fraud,Boris Nemtsov accepted responsibility for the election defeat and resigned as SPS leader in January 2004. On 28 May 2005Nikita Belykh was elected as the new leader of the party.[citation needed]
Plans to merge withYabloko were shelved in late 2006.[citation needed]
The party won 0.96% of votes in the2007 elections, not breaking the 7% barrier, and thus received no seats in the Duma.
In 2008, Nikita Belyh left his chair to Leonid Gozman. On 1 October 2008, the federal political council of the party voted to dissolve the party and merge it withCivilian Power andDemocratic Party of Russia, forming a new liberal-democratic party calledRight Cause,[5] which succeeded the SPS as a member of theInternational Democracy Union.
In 2011, a group of former members accused the Right Cause of being too close to the Russian government under Vladimir Putin and refounded the SPS, registering it as apolitical public organization. As a consequence, theInternational Democracy Union suspended the membership of the Right Cause and returned it to the new SPS.[citation needed]
On 27 February 2014, the SPS formally condemned the2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine.[6]
| Election | Candidate | First round | Second round | Result | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Votes | % | Votes | % | |||
| 2000 | EndorsedVladimir Putin | 39,740,434 | 52.94 | N/a | Won | |
| 2004 | Irina Khakamada | 2,671,313 | 3.84 | N/a | Lost | |
| 2008 | Boris Nemtsov | Withdrew from the elections, supportedKasyanov | ||||
| Election | Party leader | Performance | Rank | Government | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Votes | % | ± pp | Seats | +/– | ||||
| 1999 | Sergey Kiriyenko | 5,677,247 | 8.52% | New | 29 / 450 | New |  4th | Coalition |
| 2003 | Boris Nemtsov | 6,944,322 | 3.97% |  4.45 | 3 / 450 | 26 | 6th | Opposition |
| 2007 | Nikita Belykh | 2,408,535 | 0.96% | 3.01 | 0 / 450 | 3 | 8th | Extra-parliamentary |
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)| International | |
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| National | |
