The Putin System: An Opposing View

5 IN LIEU OF A CONCLUSION

All the actual and potential dangers emanating from Russia’s current political regime amount to a tragic grotesque, from the standpoint of historical development. The political system of present-day Russia is the expression and embodiment of the mind-set of the group of people that have been ruling it for more than twenty years. This mind-set is virtually devoid of any serious ideological frameworks of analysis, has no bedrock values beyond individual wants, and worships personal consumption and enrichment. The ruling group tries to give an ideological twist to its policies, of a kind that appeals to the most basic clannish, tribal instincts of a premodern type and to the subconscious fear of the outside world.

Yet this group actually rejects all those values that have a societal dimension and that extend beyond the horizon of individual physical existence. In the minds of its members, maximizing personal satisfaction by taking advantage of their resources of power and influence and by asserting their superiority over those who are weaker and socially vulnerable invariably prevails over the long-term interests of the body of citizens that make up today’s Russia. And, paradoxical as it may be, this means that the ruling group welcomes and approves of the trend of Russia’s population becoming less sophisticated in their ways of thinking and in their practices, in the organization and the content of their involvement with one another.

In other words, this political system maximizes the demodernization and destruction of society and minimizes everything that imparts substantive meaning, ethics, grace, and constructive development. In essence, it is a variety of a political postmodernism of sorts. It supplants meaning with shiny objects and symbols that affect the subconscious and are not intended to be thought through or analyzed in relation to other concepts. In this regard, it is telling that the present-day insignia of the Russian state eclectically combines the coat of arms of the imperial Russia, the Soviet-era anthem, and the “democratic” flag. Essentially, this is a senseless mix of disparate historical cues. And, in themselves, these symbols belong entirely to the past, which is yet another illustration of the congenital inability of this “Putin system” to solve the problems of Russia’s present and future. Instead, these problems are being cold-bloodedly pushed aside—not even to the back burner but all the way to the bottom of the agenda.

Not that this political postmodernism is a uniquely Russian phenomenon. It is burgeoning in plain sight everywhere, even in the most politically “advanced” nations and societies. Yet it arguably takes the most grotesque forms in Russia, due to the distinctive characteristics of the peripheral mind-set of Russia’s elite. And this, I believe, is one of its fundamental differences from the totalitarian systems of the past century. Neither the Nazi regime in Germany nor the Soviet system in Russia were grotesque or postmodern. Each of them was earnest in its attempts to impose upon the entire world its own consistent vision of the gist of social relationships, in its own ways. In Nazi Germany, these relationships were reduced to ethnicity and race, while in Soviet ideology they were determined by socioeconomic class. Each system generated a set of functional institutions that were tasked with putting their respective vision into practice.

Moreover, their efforts in this direction were systematic and on a grand scale. And essentially these systems were bound to end as they did, because in the past century the entire world lived and operated within real-life rather than postmodern frames of reference. Thus, one of them, the Nazi regime, was physically beaten as a result of its aggression in trying to expand beyond the confines of Germany. And, in the 1980s, the Soviet system, which was also quite dangerous, was compelled by internal reasons to drastically alter the course of development that was inherent to it.

The situation with Russia’s current political system is different. It is grotesque because it feeds off its own past without creating anything new, except for stereotypes intended for mass consumption and slogans devoid of substantive content. Russia’s present-day peripheral capitalism is rooted in the Soviet legacy, in combination with the so-called reforms of the 1990s, which did not create any of the institutions necessary for contemporary life. Neither the rule of law as such nor a comprehensive legal system nor a genuine right to private property ownership emerged during this period. All of this and many other items that were of vital necessity for Russia were supplanted with fakes—fake political competition, fake elections, fake political parties, fake parliament, fake law and order, and so on.

But real life abhors a power vacuum. And this vacuum was filled with powerful, real-life institutions that emerged in the place of those that were missing, such as corruption, relations outside of the legal framework and based on implicit “understandings,” the cult of the strongman, the Kremlin’s “manual control” over routine operations of the government, and the like. Russia certainly has institutions in their classical sense, as elements of the system of governance and self-regulation of society. But the thrust of these institutions is demodernizing, leading to Russia’s irreversible backsliding vis-à-vis the developed world, as it becomes ever more old-fashioned, as well as to the decay and ultimately the breakdown of Russian society. In other words, Russia’s present-day peripheral authoritarianism is not a “transitional” one but rather is headed toward a dead end of demodernization. Most importantly, its built-in characteristics—first and foremost the lack of change at the top of the power hierarchy and the absence of alternatives to the ruling group—deprive it of the internal tools and the driving forces required for self-adjustment to realities and for the pursuit of responses to external challenges.

Therefore, I agree with those who believe that this regime is doomed, that it will not be able to find appropriate forms and ways to adjust to realities—unless, of course, these realities themselves are altered in ways that would be catastrophic for the world. If the world succeeds in identifying a path toward sustainable growth in peace and security, and if it avoids sinking into economic chaos and military conflicts, then the new generation of Russia’s political class—those who are now in their twenties and thirties—will not be able to preserve and maintain Russia’s political system in its current shape without exposing the country to the threat of collapse and destruction.

The risk of such a turn of events is very real. Russia’s present political system has already produced some tragic outcomes by putting the country on the brink of a full-scale bloody war. The system is again spinning in the vicious circle whereby its propaganda stokes the fears of an external threat and thereby actually becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy by generating or strengthening these threats. Meanwhile, its overkill in terms of military buildup contributes to the decay of the foundations of Russia’s economy and thus does not strengthen but actually reduces Russia’s practical capabilities to withstand domestic and foreign threats to its security. Thus, the tragic farce is gradually morphing into an actual tragedy for the country and its society.

To sum up, the system of peripheral authoritarianism in Russia does not simply demonstrate its incapacity to accomplish Russia’s foremost task in the twenty-first century, which is to close the gap between Russia and the developed world. In broader terms, it also threatens the very existence of the country in its present shape. It makes Russia an easy prey for all kinds of extremists, political plunderers, and organized crime groups that may transform the state into an empty shell, unable to perform even its most basic functions. What looms on the horizon under such a scenario is anybody’s guess.

Is there a way out of this ongoing tragic farce, for Russia to move instead in the direction of modernization and development? This remains an open question, but I believe we must try to find the answer.