I read up on the Mafia state claims and whilst his Presidency has been marred by various human rights abuses and accusations of his authoritarianism, what’s Putins legacy going to be in regards to leaving Russia for better, or worse?
Well, it was a really brilliant idea of his to have the price of oil go way up.
Overall, I think it would not be an overstatement to say that Putin saved Russia when it was teetering on the brink of political, economic, and social collapse. He reversed the previous policy of blindly kowtowing to capitalist dogma, instituted wise economic reforms, cracked down on organized crime, and restored Russia to its rightful place as a global superpower.
Moreover, in case you care about such things, Putin has enjoyed and continues to enjoy unprecedented levels of support from the Russian population.
I would respectfully point out that Commisar’s view is far from the consensus, both within and outside of Russia. Under Yeltsin, Russia was beginning to develop a multi-party democracy. A flawed and impoverished one, yes, but it was on its way. That’s … pretty much done now. The Putin regime rolled back most of the democratic reforms of the 90s, abolished the election of regional governors, and has taken an interestingly violent approach towards dissent. I’d suggest asking Anna Politkovskaya, Aleksander Litvinenko, or any of the many human rights reporters who’ve died in the Caucuses about this - but, well, it seems unfair to ask the OP to invest in seance gear.
I highly recommend RFE/RL’s Russia coverage, “Darkness at Dawn”, and Politkovskaya’s “Putin’s Russia” for a balanced treatment of the regime.
How do you define “consensus?” Putin was elected President via fair and free elections for the maximum allowable number of terms. After maxing out, the candidate supported by Putin won by a landslide - largely after campaigning on a promise to maintain “plan Putina” (Putin’s plan). Sounds like a pretty solid domestic consensus to me.
So you would rather that the Russians were starving in the streets? When it comes to a choice between having enough food to live on and directly electing governors, most people will prefer the food. Talk about warped priorities…
Interesting. So you believe that any murders occuring in nation X are de facto attributable to nation X’s government? You don’t believe that some murders have no governmental components?
So, by balanced, you mean “entirely one-sided?” Are you also going to assert that, say, Fox News is “balanced?”
Isn’t it a bit early to debate “Putin’s Legacy”, when he’s still the boss of Russia?
Given the sweep of Russian history, he’s unlikely to give up power as long as he’s still alive.
How is Russia any more of a superpower now than it was before Putin?
I had the impression from other threads that Commissar was an old-style Communist. But it would be strange for a Communist to defend Putin – in Russia, the Communist Party is Putin’s main opposition.
His legacy? Reviving the tsardom.
Remember back when Alexander Lebed was going to be the boss of Russia, until he died in a mysterious helicopter crash?
Seriously.
To be fair, Russia was given the same crummy neoliberal economics advice that many countries in South America got, the result being that valuable state-owned assets ended up in the hands of the most well-connected and ruthless, while the bulk of the people got the shaft. Putin stepped into a vacuum of chaos and imposed a form of order. Not the free and democratic kind of order we were hoping for (he is ex-KGB, after all), but order nonetheless.
I think the trial of Mikhail Khodorkovsky says a lot about Putin’s character.
What about it? A willingness to crush high-placed corruption, or a willingness to crush democratizing dissent?
Wait, how would electing their provincial governors interfere with Russians’ food supply? In the U.S. we elect our state governors, and we eat.
A friend of mine, who is Russian, has repeatedly pointed out to me that what Russian people desire the most is stability followed by not having the mafia and/or robber barons control everything. It’s hard to understand just how out of control everything really was in the 90’s. Putin brought stability when the country was a giant clusterfuck of a mess. In his consolidation of power, he sharply limited the power of the mafia and the few mega wealthy. Both of which go a long way to explain why Putin has such popularity within Russia.
This is the same guy who frequently condemns Putin for freedom of press and government corruption. I think that, overall, he believes Putin is bad for Russia despite the stability. So this isn’t just the ranting of someone who’s swallowed the kool-aid, but rather the impressions of someone who has a far better knowledge of life in Russia and how it’s citizens think than I ever will.
Semi-related, my friend is also one of the few people I’ve met who agree with me that Clinton’s greatest failing was not getting more involved in aiding the new Russian democracy. A Marshall plan of sorts could have turned Russia into a friend. Instead we’re adversaries again, although thankfully not in the possible WWIII way we were adversaries during the cold war.
Actually, like it or not, a lot of Commissar’s views are in fact close to the consensus both within Russia and amongst scholars and policy makers outside of Russia. He argues that Putin institutes ‘wise economic reforms’ - and I would not go so far as to call them that because essentially they mean keeping the oligarchs in check, which is not a reform really - but it has produced some good results. And indeed, in spite of all the things you mention, Commissar’s right to point out that support for Putin’s regime remains high. Of course, he betrays some dogged Russian nationalism and disregard for fact in his claims that ‘Russia was restored to its rightful position as a superpower’ so I don’t want to be defending him too much, but I would like to point out that when you respond to his points by saying that Putin destroyed democracy, you are really missing the mark.
As for Putin’s hand in destroying nascent Russian democracy, the consensus there, at least internationally, is that he did do that. However, I take issue with Mr. Excellent’s notion that Russian democracy was ‘on it’s way’ - it was not, it was not going anywhere and all that it had brought was chaos (or at least that is how many if not most Russians perceive it, which goes a long way towards explaining Putin’s support today). Under Yeltsin, democracy was very weak and really characterized by the inability of different actors to subdue each other by extra-legal means rather than their unwillingness to do so. Russia’s party system was weak to the point of being non-existent which means that competition was largely based on individual traits and clientelistic politics between local kingpins rather than on ideological differences. Other traits of a consolidated democracy were also few and far between (I am thinking about rule of law and an absence of corruption, for instance). A final example is the incredible amount of power Yeltsin located in the office of the Russian president when he wrote the constitution, a constitution that was adopted in a popular referendum under questionable conditions, in the wake of Yeltsin shelling parliament.
I think that Russia under Yeltsin was more open than it has ever been - but it was not sustainable, and certainly not on its way to greater and more consolidated democratization. If anything, it was on its way to collapse, I am afraid, if not by Putin then eventually at the hands of someone else.
I don’t think it’s either, per se. To associate Khodorkovsky with ‘democratizing dissent’ is not really reflective of the potential political platform of this oligarch. So while it certainly has to do with crushing potential opponents, don’t hold your hope out that too much democratization would be forthcoming from these opponents.
Is there any quarter in Russia today from which pressure for democratization might be forthcoming?
At any rate we can be sure of Yeltsin’s legacy: He’s the man who midwifed the birth of Russian democracy, and then strangled it in the cradle.
No. I don’t think so. It is possible that if the current leaders are replaced with some leaders that are less politically savvy, while at the same time the economic climate worsens beyond the extent to which it has already done so, there might be a regime change with a very democratic looking facade, much like the some of the color revolutions - but this would most likely mean that power changes hands from one authoritarian clique to another. The color revolutions (most clearly so in Georgia, in spite of all of Saakashvili’s rethoric) have done just that. The orange revolution in Ukraine seems to have been slightly more successful at least as far as Yushchenko’s term in office lasted, but now that Yanukovich (who was defeated in '05) has made it into office, it looks like a lot of the democratic gains are being reversed.
These post-soviet systems share a bunch of characteristics that make it hard for pluralism to emerge. A lot of power is vested in the office of the president; secret services and police forces are strong; economic power is largely in the hands of a select few, while a middle class is not emerging. This concentration of power creates certain patterns of power, links between presidents and oligarkhs for instance, or between the president and the security services, or the media, that are very hard even for a well-meaning incumbent to escape from, and very attractive to remain stuck in - because it is the easiest way of getting things done.
So, Russia, for the indefinite future, is going to be a lot like Mexico under the PRI: A de-facto one-party (but not totalitarian nor very effectively authoritarian) state maintaining democratic forms and providing some minimal stability and a whole lot of public corruption. (Which doesn’t seem to have gotten any better since the PRI lost its lock on power.)