Source: National Archives of Estonia

On the 26 of March, the Estonian parliament (the Riigikogu) passed a constitutional amendment to remove the rights to vote in local elections for non-EU residents (Kangro, 2025). This was sparked by a motivation to disenfranchise residents who are citizens of the Russian Federation and Belarus. But the measure also strips these rights from the roughly 60,000 residents who remain stateless since the restoration of the republic in 1991 (Le Monde, 2025). This change also broke a long-standing tradition of allowing minorities to have some level of self-governance. Prior to now, permanent residents who were not Estonian citizens had a right to vote in local elections. In fact, paragraph 50 of the 1992 Estonian Constitution had read, ‘“National minorities have the right, in the interests of their culture, to establish self-governing agencies” (The Constitution of the Republic of Estonia, § 50). This development can be seen within the lens of global democratic erosion, as well as an especially dangerous compromise in democracy’s ability to endure pressure from autocratic states.

Estonia has a Freedom House rating of 96 out of 100, so it has a track record for promoting freedom and democracy. To any observer of the current tensions in Europe, it is no surprise that Estonia may have concerns over Russian and Belarussian citizens participating in civic life. The radical changes to society caused by the digital revolution have altered the ways that states interact; in particular, security is no longer constrained to nations and armies. Mass online media and worldwide communication networks have created a new security dimension that exists beyond borders. Retired US Army Maj. Gen. Robert H. Scales sounded the alarm in 2006 when, looking at the theories of war pioneered by Carl von Clausewitz, he coined the term “psycho-cultural wars.” Scales predicted that modern conflicts would be contests between populations and not governments and armies. Objectives would not be geographic but psycho-cultural, focused on who can win over public opinions through control of perceptions and the use of social tools and global media. Core to gaining the strategic advantage in the era of psycho-cultural wars is the application of understanding and empathy (Scales, 2006).

If success in modern conflicts hinges on winning over populations through understanding and empathy, then democratic countries should have a significant upper hand against authoritarian states. As Robert Dahl explained in his 1998 book On Democracy, it is the strongest system of governance that can ensure protections for personal freedoms and liberties. Democracy gives people the ability to not only have those protections, but also to secure these protections themselves through a right to civic engagement. To put it simply, democracy makes people feel secure because it allows them to act on their own behalf (Dahl, 1998). Different countries have different perspectives on what this looks like. But erasing decades of established democratic practices—even if they are more generous than other democratic systems— is an erosion of democracy regardless.

This unfortunate decision by the Riigikogu not only goes against decades of precedence for allowing local voting for residents, but it also undermines what has kept Estonian democratic society fairly stable compared to similar countries. In the 1990s some analysts expected Estonian politics to devolve into ethnic and class divisions due to the social isolation of, and unequal opportunities for, the Russian minority (Vihalemm et al., 2020). But this did not develop, in large part because of the political agency given to Russian speaking Estonian citizens and stateless residents when it came to local governance (Vihalemm et al., 2020). This did not mean Estonian society was perfect. Inequalities around ethnicity and language continue to exist. But what was important for stability was that residents had a pathway and the ability, at least to some degree, to make their voices heard through local democratic governance. Taking that away does not remove a desire for civic expression. And Russians are aware of this. In one ethnographic study on the limitation of access to media from the Russian Federation, a Russian speaking Estonian quoted by the authors put it very bluntly,

If we start forbidding the expression of opinions, then what kind of democracy are we talking about? We are simply depriving people of choice, and by doing so we take away the possibility to analyze and process information…. We are training them, so that they will take what they are offered and that is already the Soviet Union in its pure form. (Vihalemm & Juzefovičsb, 2022, p. 507)

Removing a group’s ability to express its opinions, either through speech or civic engagement, does not take away a desire to do so. This is especially true when there are persistent inequalities within the society that frustrate a minority. Democracy is what prevents these inequalities from turning into true injustices. In the context of modern psycho-cultural conflict centered on empathy and understanding, the disempowerment of a minority experiencing discrimination and inequality is not only democratically troublesome but only exacerbates the security risk. Whatever fears Estonians have of Russian citizens participating in local government must not outweigh the importance of democratic principles. And when modern conflicts are won and lost by expressions of understanding and empathy to appeal to the minds of interconnected people, the carrot of democratic participation is a far stronger defense than a stick of civil alienation.

References

Dahl, R. A. (1998). On Democracy. Yale University Press.
Le Monde. (2025, March 26). Estonia’s parliament bans local voting for non-Europeans, targeting Russians. https://www.lemonde.fr/en/russia/article/2025/03/26/estonia-s-parliament-bans-local-voting-for-non-europeans-targeting-russians_6739540_140.html
Kangro, K. (2025, March 26). The Riigikogu passed constitutional amendment restricting the right to vote. Riigikogu. https://www.riigikogu.ee/en/news-from-committees/constitutional-committee/the-riigikogu-passed-constitutional-amendment-restricting-the-right-to-vote/
Scales, R. H., (2006, July 1). Clausewitz and World War IV. Armed Forces Journal. http://armedforcesjournal.com/clausewitz-and-world-war-iv/
Vihalemm, T., & Juzefovičs, J. (2022). How Baltic Russian-speaking audiences outmaneuver securitization, essentialization, and polarization in times of crisis? Journal of Baltic Studies, 53(4), 495–517. https://doi.org/10.1080/01629778.2021.2006728
Vihalemm, T., Seppel, K., & Leppik, M. (2020). Russians in Estonia: integration and translocalism. In Kalmus, V., Lauristin, M., Opermann, S., Vihalemm, T. (Ed.), Researching Estonian Transformation: Morphogenetic Reflections (251-292). University of Tartu Press. (2020).