[V]oter apathy is widespread, as is a deeply conservative mood, leading to a low turnout. Even here, in the gritty industrial and heavily militarized Urals region of Sverdlovsk - which has a tradition of anti-government protest - more than 60 percent of voters didn't bother casting ballots at all. And while those in the region who did vote swung somewhat more anti-establishment than most, the lack of engagement, both here and in Russia, could signal a more seismic political reaction from voters down the road, experts say.

"It's not the voters who supported UR, but the majority of Russians who didn't vote at all that we should be worrying about," says Andrei Koryakovtsev, an independent political expert in Yekaterinburg, Sverdlovsk's capital. "If they don't believe in the electoral system to register their views, then the chances of people taking it into the streets instead will grow."