Paul
Goble
Staunton, September 26 – Putinism is
“not the harsh authoritarianism of a Belarusian, Iraqi or Syrian type” but
rather a kind of “dispersed despotism” in which in each segment of the polity
and society there is combined “complete chaos and a Brownian motion of
micro-dictators,” according to Moscow commentator Yevgeny Ikhlov.
In a comment posted on the
Forum-MSK.org portal today, Ikhlov argues that Yevgeny Gontmakher’s recent
suggestion that the state does not exist in Russia today seemed strange but in
fact highlighted an important reality: there is no single vertical that imposes
the will of the top on those below (forum-msk.org/material/politic/10057519.html).
Instead,
Ikhlov argues, what has emerged in Russia and what can be called Putinism is “not
the harsh authoritarianism of the Belarusian, Iraqi (under Saddam) or Syrian
(under Asad) type.” Instead it is “an analogue to enlightened Russian autocracy
as it existed under Alexander II and again under Brezhnev, a certain scattered
and dispersed despotism.”
“In
each cell of the system, including civil society,” he writes, “there is
authoritarianism but also complete chaos and a Brownian motion of
micro-dictators.” The center can enforce its will at any time down to the local
level but only if it uses the special services and targets this or that
place. It cannot enforce its will
everywhere all the time.
Many
in Russia “idealize” authoritarianism, assuming that they are sacrificing their
freedoms for order, but in doing so, they forget that authoritarianism may not
bring order even while it takes away freedom, a lesson that many in Russia had
learned before 1917 and many in Europe had learned even earlier.
Three
recent cases show that the Kremlin “not only cannot control the next levels down
of the state apparatus but does not even know what is going on in the
territories” nominally under its control.
The
first case involves Nadezha Tolokonnikova of Pussy Riot. Moscow sent her to a place where it assumed
she would not suffer very much because senior officials knew that she would
ultimately be released and would not be quiet or ignored before or after that
event. But the officials in the camp
ignored those calculations and behaved brutally, giving Moscow a PR black eye.
The
second involves the seizure of the Greenpeace ship in the Arctic. Clearly those who did so failed to recall
that Vladimir Putin would be speaking at the Third International Arctic Forum
in Salekhard and did not need the distraction.
As a result, these officials “almost buried the Valdai propagandistic
achievements” of the Russian president.
And
third, Kemerovo Oblast banned all foreign adoptions, ignoring both Moscow’s
obligations under international treaties and the center’s propaganda needs in
the run up to the Sochi Olympics, yet another example of the lack of an
integral state on the territory of the Russian Federation.
Indeed,
Ikhlov writes, Putinism as a result of such cases is “completely unmasked” as
far as its “powerlessness to carry out a consistent policy.” And it is unmasked in front of those who
matter most: more junior officials who are supposed to be its “most reliable
agents and who are literally supposed to guess by telepathy the will of the top
boss.”
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