Russia, Lost in Transition

"Lilia Shevtsova is fascinating on this. She is a great democrat, who works for the Carnegie Endowment, which exists quite happily in Russia. She traces the reasons behind Yeltsin-style pseudo-democracy and the rise of Putin-style authoritarianism. A lot of it can be attributed to the second election in 1996, which Yeltsin effectively gerrymandered and bought the election. Some of the great TV journalists of that time, who had been really fearless in the early 1990s, also allowed themselves to be bought by Yeltsin. Part of that was well intentioned because it was ‘the means justify the ends’. It was either going to be Yeltsin or the resurgent communists, and do we really want that? We’ll suspend democracy in the short term to save democracy in the long term. Exactly. And it’s a classic non-starter but kind of understandable at the time, but in so doing they undermined democracy fatally. And it all started to unravel quite quickly, and there was Yeltsin’s drunkenness. Putin had a pretty clear idea of what he wanted to do – of course a lot of it was determined by events and no politician has absolute clarity, but he very early on cracked down on the only very critical TV station, he started cracking down on Radio Free Europe and on particular journalists, and then there was famous arrest of Khodorkovsky in 2003, which was designed to encourage the others [oligarchs] to stay in line. Putin’s relations with the oligarchs is endlessly fascinating because they then saw the writing on the wall and they accepted the terms of the trade, which were absolute political non-engagement in terms of criticism plus lining some people’s pockets where required in return for relative security. But they never got total security, which is why most of their money is now kept in London where it is indulgently laundered by the British government. And Shevtsova traces how Putin did this incrementally, and his popularity. But again it falls into the theory of the trade-off. Putin did not mess with people’s private freedoms. Private freedoms were flourishing: the best sushi in the world outside Japan is in Moscow. My Russian friends, the people who climbed on to the tanks in 1991, they have an expression which is that there are only three Cs that matter: Courchevel, Chelsea and Cartier. And if you give people those three, they will be fine. But again it falls into the theory of the trade-off. I remember two years ago or so, Chelsea [football club] playing Manchester United in Moscow in the Champions League final. Chelsea, of course, is owned by a Russian. And all these English football fans were there playing football in Red Square. Saying ‘What’s the problem, this is a great country?’ And the Chelsea ticket touts who are normally on the Fulham Road outside the Chelsea grounds, were standing in Red Square touting tickets right in front of the Russian police and offering them up in dollars, sterling, roubles or euros. That is the ultimate image and metaphor of modern authoritarianism, which is you allow people to express themselves in their private arena, defined as anything that doesn’t affect the state. Today that is the great challenge for civil liberties groups, to combat the idea that private freedoms are enough, are all that matter. You have to come to terms with this challenge. In Russia you have all the same Saturday night TV shows syndicated – Who wants to be a Millionaire, Russia’s Got Talent, it’s all the same – and the TV news has very high production values but they only report certain things. The trade-off will only really work if there is no arbitrariness, if it is all codified and if you know where you stand. And the fact is that it doesn’t, particularly in Russia on the question of property rights. In my view a properly successful 21st century authoritarian state needs to establish a properly codified set of laws that ensure that your company and your house and your business will not be raided by the tax police just because you have got on the wrong side of the local chieftain. Can you achieve that where you don’t have transparency? Well, it’s hugely doubtful. But Singapore argues that it has achieved just that – to build the ultimate authoritarian state that is very uncorrupt and guarantees these private freedoms."