Paul
Goble
Staunton, February 14 – Leaders of
democratic countries seldom make radical changes in course because they are
enmeshed in a web of relationships that makes that difficult if not impossible
in the absence of some external threat. But dictators are different: they have
fewer constraints and thus sometimes do the most unexpected things.
Thus, to give but one of a long line of
examples, Hitler changed from a man who had made his career as an opponent of
communist suddenly transformed himself into Stalin’s ally by the
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact only to betray his new “partner” two years later by
reverting to type and invading the Soviet Union.
Or to take another, domestic example:
Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin rose through the CPSU as completely loyal
apparatchiks and used the authoritarian resources at their command, only to
transform themselves incompletely to be sure and thereby changed the direction
of their country toward a more open future.
That special feature of authoritarian
regimes has spawned a cottage industry in Moscow and the West which hold out
the possibility that Vladimir Putin could at some point radically change
course, typically in the direction that those speculating on that possibility
want, and that this possibility is something everyone needs to keep in mind.
Thus, it is sometimes suggested that if
the West behaves in a way that Putin wants, the Kremlin leader will become
again the reformer committed to a liberalization of the economic system they
always believed he was. And consequently, the Kremlin undoubtedly welcomes such
discussions as a means of keeping the West divided and off balance.
But however that may be, such
discussions can be suggestive of where Putin and the Russian political system
are and where they may be heading. And consequently, one presented by the
editors of the Rusrand.ru portal between one analyst who thinks he could change
course radically and one who says he can’t or won’t may be valuable.
At a recent Moscow seminar on “The
Possibilities of a Perestroika of the Model of Russia Toward a post-Liberal
Form in an Evolutionary Way under the Leadership of V.V. Putin,” Vardan
Bagdasaryan and Stepan Sulakshin, two researchers at the Moscow Center for
Scientific Political Thought and Ideology, faced off on this question.
In a nearly 6,000-word presentation, Bagdasaryan
argued that Putin, like earlier Russian rulers and for the same reasons, has a
chance to make a radical departure from where his current policies and move to
a mobilization regime (usrand.ru/docconf/shans-na-obnovlenie-rossii-putinym--suschestvuet).
For him, the question is not whether
Putin can do so but rather what might be “the catalyst” for what he calls “a
Ceasarian transition to a post-liberal model.”
He suggests there are in fact many things that could trigger him to act:
“the threat of a color revolution” or “a frontal attack” by the West, two thing
that would force him to act or lead to “the fall of the regime and the collapse
of the country.”
Sulakshin, on
the other hand, argued that there is a “minimal” chance that Putin will do so
not only because of his own values but because of the web of relationships of
which he is a part. Consequently, he predicts in his paper that Putin won’t
change much regardless of the threats he faces (rusrand.ru/docconf/shans-na-obnovlenie-rossii-samim-putinym-minimalnyj).
Both of these analysts share a
preference for a turn to a mobilization system, but their arguments may also
apply to other course corrections Putin might select, including a return to a
more liberal system. And thus their detailed listings of the resources he has
and the restrictions he is operating under may be useful to those open to the
possibility that Putin may change in some major way – or alternatively to those
who are certain that he won’t.
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