#5
Subject: Re: 5608-Shlapentokh/Putin
Date: Fri, 21 Dec 2001 12:48:45
From: bmilanovic@worldbank.org (Branko
Milanovic)
I found Vladimir Shlapentokh's piece on Putin and "anti-Americanism" of Russian elites most interesting. Although I have not been in Russia for several years, I tend to be quite persuaded by Vladimir's description of the feelings among the elite and the "people." Yet, I would suggest a somewhat different interpretations of the facts.
While Vladimir considers the elites' reaction to the recent events to be grounded in some knee-jerk "anti-Americanism" and yearning for a great power status, it can be, I think, much more easily explained by arguing that it represents rather a "normalization" or "Europeanization" of the Russian elite's opinion. In other words, their current opinions are no longer influenced by the former USSR-USA rivalry, nor by the unreasonable (and unrequited) Russian euphoria after the fall of Communism. They are much more sober and in line with general feelings in Europe, particularly in the continental Western Europe. I think that Vladimir found his counterparts' opinions very strange and unusual precisely because he came to St. Petersburg or Moscow straight from the US. Had he spent some time in Western Europe (say, Paris or Italy and even London) he would have found his Russian colleagues' views not unusual at all but rather fully in keeping with the elites' opinions in the continental Europe.
And that opinion, as the recent results of the Pew world wide poll show. is that (1) the US policies are viewed by most of the world as arrongant and unilateral (recent examples are too numerous to quote), (2) that the US official reaction, driven by popular sentiment, is often viewed as disproportional (as for example where curtailments of civil liberties are explained by a terrorist threat which in turn is likened to the threat posed to liberty by Hitler and Japan in the early 1940's--a view ludicrously at odds with reality), and (3) that Tocqueville's statements regarding the danger which populism poses for liberty might have never been more pertinent. The American problem, if I dare say so, is that the combination of often simplistic media coverage and population who are too busy making their own living to follow international affairs, produces a huge populistic wave which engulfs everything before itself, makes government follow the polls blindly, and allied to a huge imperial power, produces tectonic changes in many places of the world. I would thus see the description of the Russian elite's view as a very good sign--showing that they are sober analysts, rather than blind nationalists, or at the other extreme, unthinking cheerleaders.
Best, Branko Milanovic
Development Research Group
World Bank, 1818 H Street N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20433
tel: 1-202-473-6968
fax: 1-202-522-1153
Email: bmilanovic@worldbank.org
See the updated Website:
http://www.worldbank.org/research/transition/
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