Russian Liberalism Now has an Opening Because Kremlin has Stopped Promoting Free Markets, Kynyev Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, July 4 – Many Russians blame liberalism for what happened to their country in the 1990s; and because that is the case, Russian liberals appear to have few prospects to make a comeback. But Aleksandr Kynyev says that is a mistake and that Russian liberalism does have a future if it overcomes five fundamental problems.

            The economist says that it is important to remember that the liberals were not in leading positions in Russia three decades ago. Instead, the country was dominated by former Soviet officials who promoted economic liberalism but not political liberalization as well (moscowtimes.ru/2024/07/03/rossiiskie-liberali-buduschee-est-a135723).

            As a result, Russian liberals continued to speak out about law and human rights but not about economic ones that seemed to have been recognized. That had the effect of ghettoizing liberals who came to be viewed by most Russians as obsessed only with human rights issues and meant that they did not address economic issues of interest to most Russians.

            But over the last several years, the Kremlin has moved away from economic liberalization toward a dirigiste system. That gives Russian liberals an opening if they will but take it, Kynyev continues; but unfortunately, up to now, they have continued to focus solely on political liberalization and thus ceded an important part of any debate to others.

            The Kremlin until recently successfully played on this, promoting economic liberalization while at the same time drawing on Russian traditional authoritarian political arrangements. But now “for the first time in 30 years,” the regime has begun to undermine economic liberalization as well. “Inertia” has kept Russian liberals from exploiting this opening.

            That is only one of the problems keeping liberalism from making a comeback, problems that liberals themselves have it in their power to overcome if they will focus on what is actually going on and change their message and approach, Kynyev says. Among the most important of these all inherited from the past but continuing now are the following:

·       Again and again since the 1990s, Russian liberals have avoided open political struggle for votes, preferring instead to work with officials behind the scenes or issue programmatic statements that few pay attention to.

·       “Initially, Russia’s systemic liberals were part of the establishment and were able to speak only with the establishment.” They have never been seriously interested in developing ties with “the enormous Russian periphery.”

·       Instead of advancing new names with new ideas, Russian liberals for the last two decades have stayed with the leaders they had had earlier even if those people were not able to achieve their proclaimed goals by coming up with new ideas and competing for votes.

·       And finally, liberals have often forgotten that people don’t vote for ideologies but for the specific programs that this or that politician promotes. “The majority do not know anything about liberalism, conservatism, socialism or any other doctrines.” But liberals continue to act as if the situation were otherwise.

According to Kynyev, Russians “support many liberal ideas without knowing that those ideas are liberal, ideas like freedom of private property, entrepreneurship, freedom of speech, freedom of movement, right to privacy, low taxes, political competition and so on.” Russian liberals need to build on that and stop worrying about any overarching label.