Prime Minister, and de facto dominant leader in the Russian political system, Vladimir Putin, must have been taken by surprise at the revolt against his regime following the recent parliamentary elections in the country. There would appear to be a widespread belief that the authorities fiddled with the voting arrangements in order to ensure the return of Putin’s United Russia to a dominant position in the system. The fact that the results of the elections were somewhat disappointing to Putin and his party, may have led him to believe that the general population would have let sleeping dogs lie and allowed him to smoothly move into office as president again. But to his surprise, the protests have continued, in spite of efforts by current President Medvedev to indicate that the new administration will move to introduce, in his words, “more comprehensive reform of our political system,” including the direct elections of governors of the various regions, as against their appointment by the president.
The fact of the matter is that there seems to be a sense among the Russian electorate that, having been liberated from the autocratic political arrangements of the era of Soviet Russia through President Yeltsin’s reforms after the fall of Mikhail Gorbachev now twenty years ago, Prime Minister and future President Putin appears to be wanting to tighten and centralize the political system again, to the detriment of popular liberties. In addition there is a sense among the population that Putin should not have sought to take up the presidency once again, an initiative that would place him in power for sixteen years after his next four year term. In that context, the protests have taken an anti-Putin, as well as anti-system turn which, no doubt, has induced Gorbachev to publicly state that Putin should withdraw from again assuming the presidency – sardonically pointing out that if he Gorbachev could do it, there is nothing to prevent Putin from following suit. The suggestion is for term limits for the Russian leadership similar, no doubt, to what exists in the United States. This reflects a view that no matter how well the leadership of a country does, there should be no automatic entitlement to continue beyond a certain time period.
The protests, however, also reflect a more widespread, than simply populist, dissent against the regime. From the time that Putin announced his intention to seek the presidency again, senior officials of the regime have indicated their displeasure. For one, the much respected Minister of Finance Alexei Kudrin announced his resignation from that post. And substantial Russian businessmen, to take one case Mikhail Prokhorov, have now announced an intention to run against Putin for the presidency. This in part now simply reflects concerns about a possible tightening and centralizing of the decision-making system under a new Putin presidency. But it also reflects emerging differences of view among the political and business elite as to the direction that the economy should now take. Persons like Kudrin, perhaps reflecting Medvedev’s views, believe that Putin’s inclination to substantially rest the economy on Russia’s oil and natural gas productive base – a stance which has undoubtedly enhanced the foreign reserves of the country – will, in the medium term inhibit a reorganization of the industrial economy that would make Russia more competitive in the present and future world economy. Their view is that Russia continues to look too much like a developing world economy, based on agricultural and mineral commodities now in major global demand. In that sense there is seen to be a recoiling of the present leadership from a stance which characterised even the Khrushchev era, that Russia’s competitive arena is with the United States, and that this requires a diversified industrial and high technology-based economy.
But below the concerns of the elites, lie concerns more particular to the Russian middle class. It is notable that the present protests are led largely by the urban middle class, also concerned with a stabilising of the economy that inhibits periodic bouts of inflation and a diminution of their savings. This middle class, too, wishes to see less interference in their pursuit of various liberties similar to those experienced in the western world. They perceive Putin as inclined to periodic autocratic behaviour, and to disparage their demands for the development of a stable and predictable political system.
Finally, among the Russian private and public decision-making elite, a discussion continues about the status of Russia in the emerging global political system. For Putin the challenge to Russian decision-making has not only been domestic, but also external, commencing with the attempt by George Bush to spread NATO’s net into countries and regions historically perceived by Russia (and the Soviet leadership) as coming within their sphere of influence. Some years ago, Putin announced that the dissolution of the Soviet Union was one of the historical and strategic tragedies that had occurred to the country and its prestige. His view was enhanced as the US sought to spread the nuclear net into some Eastern European Union countries, in particular Georgia (the birthplace of Stalin) and the Ukraine (the birthplace of Khrushchev). Putin has never taken kindly to US diplomatic intrusions into these areas, or to the European Union’s attempts to draw some of the countries of what used to be called the “world socialist system” into the EU system – and therefore from Putin’s perspective, into the NATO system.
So the debate going on in Russia, reflected now in the protest against the recent elections, goes beyond mere domestic concerns. Putin sees himself as committed to a multi-dimensional approach to Russia’s future. On the other hand, the popular protests seem to reflect a concern with the need for the consolidation of a liberalised political system, a reduction in a dominant role of the state that lessens possibilities for private sector employment, and a distancing of individuals from the kind of powerful hand of the state that has characterized so much of Russian history.
