Russia: Other Points of View

IS THE TANDEM RUNNING OUT OF TIME? RUSSIA - TOWARDS ANOTHER REVOLUTIONARY MOMENT?

COMMENTARY

by Gordon M. Hahn

Is Russia’s ruling tandem and its strategy of gradual reforms short on time?  Is Russia inching towards another revolutionary moment?  Could be.  Revolutions typically begin as reforms and develop over long periods of time, in stages and waves.  For example, Russia’s early 20^th century revolution began in the 1860s and went through several stages before being hijacked by the Bolshevik coup in 1917.  Even after that a four-year long civil war was needed to settle the issue.  As in the late Soviet period that ended with Boris Yeltsin’s revolution from above, the first Russian revolution included several periods of limited reforms and two revolutionary crises:  one in 1905 and another a full 12 years later.

In the late 1980s Mikhail Gorbachev began radical reforms of the decayed totalitarian Soviet system.  Those reforms developed such that by 1991 they could have ended in revolution from below or a transition to democracy, but instead a peaceful revolution from below led by state bureaucrats took the lead in destroying what was left of the Soviet Party-state and constructing the new post-Soviet Russia. 

Russian President Boris Yeltsin demobilized civil society and failed to institutionalize democracy.  His successor Vladimir Putin sought to address the chaos by restoring elements of authoritarianism, emphasizing state development rather than civil society or democratic development.  As we have covered in some detail, since the onset of Dmitrii Medvedev’s presidency, a new stage of reforms has begun, reflected by a gradual thaw or liberalization of domestic and foreign policy: a gradual, more cautious Perestroika 2.0.  However, there are real limits to the thaw that risk another period of instability and regime transformation.

RUSSIAN FEDERATION WEEKLY SITREP

by Patrick Armstrong

Revolutions. The Arab Revolution is making a few people (Gorbachev for one) speculate about the possibility of a similar rising in Russia. Speculation about a Russian “Arab scenario” is little more than wishful thinking from a negligible opposition that agrees on almost nothing. The “Arab revolution” is sui generis: rulers-for-life enriching their circle while impoverishing everyone else and populations in which half are under 30 or 25 with little to hope for. And some outside advice. This is not Russia: simply stated, the necessary conditions are not there. The Duumvirate remains popular and for good reason: Russians can see and touch the improvement in their situation over the past decade. If in 15-20 years the same people were on top still taking about police reform, cooruption and modernisation that would be a different story. However, some of the other post Soviet states, especially those with rulers-for-life, could develop that way. One place to keep an eye on is Georgia: if Saakashvili contrives to stay in power (as he seems to be trying) and we have another few years of stagnation and blaming everything on Russia, it could happen there – at least some of the opposition says so.

THE THIRD TURN

ROPV CONTRIBUTORS

by Patrick Armstrong

The hypothesis of this essay is that the conventional Western view of post-Communist Russia has passed through two cycles and is entering a third. While the first two were grounded mostly on what observers wished to see, the third is shaping up to be based more on reality.

Little Brother

As Tom Graham wisely observed some years ago: while no one will take seriously a country with a declining GDP, no one can ignore one whose GDP is rising. When the USSR fell apart in 1991, its extraordinarily centralised economy, whose links were now were blocked by new national borders, choked and died. Living standards sank, inflation exploded, the tax base collapsed, state employees went months without pay, factory employees were paid in kind, the social support system failed and the demographic decline that had begun in the Khrushchev period accelerated. All indicators worsened at once. This was the time when “free fall” was a favourite descriptor. A reminder of this period was a piece that appeared in the Atlantic Monthly in 2001, starkly entitled: “Russia is Finished.” Still available on the Net, it makes curious reading today.

MAINSTREAM MEDIA BACKTRACKING ON TULIP AND COLORED REVOLUTIONS

COMMENTARY

By Gordon Hahn

Recent articles in The Washington Post (WP) and Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reveal a brusque aboutface underway in the mainstream media in assessing the so-called ‘color revolutions’ in the 2000s.  In response to Kyrgyzstan’s narcomafia-sparked interethnic violence, they have responded with a somewhat different take on the Kyrgyz ‘tulip revolution’ after for years touting it as a pro-democracy revolution from below and a rejection of Russia and its authoritarian model in a regional ‘great game’ between the light of Western democracy and the darkness of Russian autocracy and imperialism.  The new take has much in common with my own on Russia: Other Points of View (ROPV) that these ‘revolutions’ had more in common with ‘revolutions from above’ or better intra-elite palace coups supported in a secondary and limited role of elements in society, one narrowly proscribed by elite clans pulling the strings.  These revolutions’ rejection of Russia, in the cases where this was a factor at all, for example, as in Georgia and Ukraine, was driven by a desire to garner Western, in particular U.S. economic assistance and thus a willingness to permit U.S. involvement in the ‘revolution.’  The new cold war or great game, in my view, was driven as much or more by American hubris and cold war attitudes as Russian resentment, gruffness, and overreactions.

Rethinking Russia: U.S.-Russian Relations in an Age of American Triumphalism

REPRINTS

Interview with Stephen F. Cohen, Professor of Russian Studies and History at New York University and Professor of Politics Emeritus at Princeton University

Journal of International Affairs

Spring/Summer 2010

Journal: The world recently commemorated the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. How has this event been received in Russia?

Cohen: For Russians, the more important date is this March, which marks 25 years since Mikhail Gorbachev came to power and began the reforms he called perestroika. There will be very conflicting opinions in the Russian press about what happened to the nation in the past 25 years. The angriest view will lament the loss of the Soviet Union, which many Russians still do.

THE ANTI-TULIP REVOLUTION

COMMENTARY

By Gordon M. Hahn

U.S. officialdom and mainstream media grossly overestimated the extent to which the ‘colored’ Orange, Tulip and Rose “revolutions” were truly democratic and revolutions – that is, broad revolts seeking fundamental political, economic, and social systems turnovers and driven largely ‘from below’ rather than by inter-clan and intra-strate power struggles.  

Following the Ukrainian people’s rejection of the leader of Orange Revolution n January––April saw the overturn of the Tulip revolution and the ouster of President Bakiev by the Kyrgyz precisely because he rolled back rather than developed democracy.  Unfortunately he maintained the corrupt, regional clan-style politics extant in Kyrgyzstan and much of Central Asia and the former USSR.

The Washington Post, Stratfor and a few other media organs did their best to charge Russia with orchestrating the anti-Tulip revolution.  The WP claimed that Russia “fueled” the revolt in Kyrgyzstan against the Tulip “putsch.” 

Now the vaunted democratic Tulip Revolution has been relegated to a lowly putsch.  The only evidence of Russian ‘fuel,’ amounted to little more than routine levers of foreign policy: presidential ‘lectures’, offering or cutting foreign aid, and media campaigns.  

RUSSIAN FEDERATION WEEKLY SITREP

by Patrick Armstrong

The Sobchak influence. Medvedev and Putin are disciples and admirers of Anatoliy Sobchak and both commemorated the tenth anniversary of his death on Saturday.  Medvedev, who knew him as one of his students and later worked with him in St Petersburg, gave praise to “the man who first brought legitimacy to Soviet politics”. In an interview for a program on his life and work, Putin paid very high tribute to him. He described how he began working for him when he was Mayor of St Petersburg, how he quit the KGB in the August 1991 coup attempt (“I wrote a letter of resignation in the first hours after the coup began… The point is that I had made my choice and I could not change it. It was my duty to be there, defending our shared ideals and the concept of national development which Mr Sobchak and I had put into words and implemented together.”) and how much he learned from him in work habits and morality: “The time when I worked with Mr Sobchak was the most valuable part of my education. It was in that period that my basic principles of work and communication took shape. The fundamentals of my personal principles and behaviour probably began to develop much earlier, at home and later at the university, where I studied and he taught. However, my work with him had tremendous practical significance for me”. So we have both the present and previous Presidents telling us that they regard Sobchak as their mentor and example and regard their times working under him as formative. Perhaps, the Kommentariat should pay more attention to this relationship and less to the lazy assumption that all we need to know is that Putin was a KGB officer and Medvedev is his sock puppet.

UKRAINE PREPARES TO VOTE

ARTICLE CRITIQUE

Response to Washington Post "Kremlin Intensifies Pressure as Ukraine Prepares for Vote - Russia Lodges List of Complaints Against Neighbor" by Philip P.Pan, Sep 14, 2009 

by Gordon Hahn

The Washington Post article reviewed below is littered with one-sided opinion masquerading as news.  The article, which insinuates into readers minds the view that Russia is planning aggression against Ukraine and is solely to blame for the deterioration in relations between the two countries, contains numerous inaccurate statements, claims unsupported by data or facts, and a consistently one-sided perspective.  No facts are brought to bear that show any Russian intent to commit aggression against Ukraine.  It should be noted that this article follows a summer replete with articles in the Post and other mainstream media and other news outlets purporting to show that Russia would attack Georgia this summer.  ROPV continues to wait and see when those predictions will be borne out in reality and whether anyone else will hold the U.S. mainstream media responsible in any way for its misleading reporting.

To access the full analysis, please click here Download WP_Pan_14_Sep_09

RUSSIAN FEDERATION WEEKLY SITREP

by Patrick Armstrong

Ukraine. On the 11^th Medvedev sent a sort of open letter to Ukrainian President Yushchenko complaining about relations and enumerating Russia’s complaints (for the majority of which Yushchenko would be most responsible). Reactions are  appearing: some mocking, some thoughtful. I don’t understand the point of this. Yushchenko will not be the next President of Ukraine and whoever replaces him will have a more reasonable relationship with Russia. According to Gallup, approval of their government by Ukrainians is “the lowest in the world”. Surely the best thing for Moscow to do, if it wants a Ukrainian government interested in more than the “colour revolution package” of irritating Moscow and joining NATO, is to keep its mouth shut and wait for the Ukrainian people themselves to toss Yushchenko out. They need no encouragement from Medvedev: the “Orange Revolution” was based on false premises. As to the Ukrainian arms deliveries to Georgia (and I’d still like to know who paid for them), that’s percolating away in the background in Ukraine and needs no help from Medvedev either. It will likely re-surface with the new President in January, whether Tymoshenko or Yanukovych. So, altogether unnecessary, silly and rather whiney.

Economy. Some numbers aren’t as bad as previously. Unemployment is reported to have slightly declined (from 6.7 million to 6.3 million or 8.3% of the economically active population).  GDP is reported to have grown 7.5% in the 2^nd quarter over the 1^st (but, year-on-year, is down 10.9%). Has it bottomed out?

RUSSIAN FEDERATION WEEKLY SITREP

by Patrick Armstrong

Putin popularity. At last, there is a reasonably intelligent piece on Putin’s popularity. But, while it makes the important point strongly, it is still has some of the clichés that clutter up Western reporting. The important point is that Putin’s popularity has held up despite the fall in oil prices. However, it is a cliché that his popularity suffered with the Kursk sinking (presumably the feeling is that Western leader would in a similar case), the piece claims a “significant drop”, but the chart shows only about one point lost and soon regained. Someone is quoted dragging out the hoariest cliché of all: Russians’ alleged “lasting desire for strongman leadership.” No, it’s much simpler than that. Compare Russia’s prospects in 1999 with today’s. Russians give Putin’s team credit for the improvement across the board: higher standard of living, greater stability and cohesion, increased position in the world and all the rest. There’s nothing mysteriously Russian about it: people like effective leaders everywhere. Another point to reflect on is that many observers assume that they can measure political freedom by the level of opposition they perceive. They see opposition in Georgia or Ukraine, but little in Russia. But, as the piece shows, since 2000 about seven out of ten Russians have approved of Putin; an observer will have to look much harder there to find an opponent than in the other two countries where the government structure is much less popular. There it’s easy to find opponents of the government: in Ukraine more than nine out of ten disapprove the government and in Georgia - eight out of ten. And, I suspect, they are much more passionate about their disapproval.