Paul
Goble
Staunton, February 21 – The
stagnation of the economy is leaving Vladimir Putin without the resources he
earlier had to buy off the population and forced him to try to awake in it “an
unselfish love for the authorities by using massive brain washing, according to
a professor at the European University in St. Petersburg.
In blog post on Rosbalt.ru, Dmitry
Traven argues that Putin in effect is creating his “third political regime.” His first, which existed between 2000 and
2004 was designed by Aleksandr Voloshin and involved the pushing out of those
who had been part of the Yeltsin family and the establishment of Putin’s
personal rule (rosbalt.ru/blogs/2014/02/20/1235632.html).
The
second which lasted from 2004 until the winter of 2011-2012 was organized by
Vladislav Surkov, included the Medvedev eraandinvolved “may declaration but
nothing changed.” The current third regime can be said to have appeared when
Surkov was replaced by Vyacheslav Volodin and is likely to define political
life in Russia for the coming years.
` To
understand the nature of the shift that is now taking place, Traven suggests, it
is useful to list the key features of the second Surkov period. They include the
establishment of state control over television as the most important means of
forming public opinion while permitting relative freedom in the Internet, a few
papers, and radio stations.
Second, they include the holding of
elections on party lists to exclude “the so-called ‘small parties’” with the
results guaranteed by the use of television to reach the mass voter.
Businessmen were brought into line and those few who weren’t were punished to
encourage the others.
Third, the “systemic opposition” was
allowed in the Duma “in order to imitate the presence of ‘sovereign democracy,”
while ensuring that the Kremlin could dominate the situation there. Each party
had a role to play and understood the limits under which it and the others were
operating.
Fourth, as insurance if United Russia
were to weaken, Surkov created “a reserve party of power” in the form of “‘Just
Russia.’” And fifth, and again to give the illusion of democracy, this system
allowed Just Russia and United Russia to compete but only for the same Putin
electorate and only in ways that did not weaken Putin, against whom no criticism
was allowed.
In doing all this, Surkov did not
take into consideration the fact that Just Russia wasn’t prepared to assume
such a subordinate position forever and was prepared to beak some of the rules
to gain more power. That contributed to the public protests of the
intellectuals who were supposed to sit quietly at their computers and watch the
Internet.
That failure of imagination led many
to conclude that Surkov had to go, a conclusion that as reinforced by the
rising tide of economic problems in the way of the crisis of 2008-2009 and by
the recognition that the economy was not going to return soon to a period of
rapid growth and that the regime would thus lose one of its most effective
resources for maintaining support.
Indeed, Travin says, the danger arose
that the loyal voters whose views were formed by television would eventually
find out what was happened and become interested in protests because of the
loss of work, pay cuts, and pension reductions; Something new was needed and
Surkov had to be replaced.
Volodin arrived and came up with a
six-part system. First, he recognized
that it was “necessary to separate the potential protest of the impoverished
Russian boondocks from the protest of intellectual leaders who were waiting for
the opportunity to return to the Bolotnaya.” That required the discrediting of
the most prominent leaders of the latter in the eyes of the population.
Second, the third regime required
passing laws in which “absolutely everything was prohibited,” the application
of which could be used against almost anyone at the regime’s choosing.
Third, under its terms, the Duma was
to work almost constantly because “theme limitations on freedom it established,
the greater would be the fear of the simple man of violating one defined norm
or other.” Such a mass of laws provided the system with the tools to use
against dissent much like those the KGB under Andropov used 30 years ago.
Fourth, by separating the
intellectuals from the masses, the regime found it easier to impose a new
ideology on the latter, an ideology that would both justify how things are and
the ways in which the leadership has chosen to move forward. In this, television would be used to promote
public pride and thus public loyality.
Fifth, the third regime moved to
impose these ideological postulates on the schools in order to ensure the rise
of a new “correct” generation. And
sixth, although it was no longer possible to buy off the entire population because
of the slowing economy, this third regime is predicated on offering the masses circuses
and some new leaders bread to ensure loyalty.
According to Traven, the new system
now under construction is both “complex and internally not internally
contradictory. All of its elements
support one another, just as was the case with the elements of Surkov’s system.”
But its greater harshness reflects the problems of the economy, the lack of
money to buy support, and the need to brain wash people into giving it.
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