#20 - JRL 8305 - JRL Home
Date: Fri, 23 Jul 2004
From: Gordon Hahn <gordonhahn@fulbrightweb.org>
Subject: Hahn on Pipes/Lukin etc.

I would like to make a contribution to the Pipes/Lukin discussion. I should preface my remarks by noting that I had the unique fortune to attend Richard Pipes' superb lectures on the Russian Revolution of 1917 at Harvard University in the mid-80s through an agreement between him and my then professor at Boston College, Donald Carlisle as part of a Reading & Research course I was taking at the time. On the other hand, I know Vladimir Petrovich from interviewing and through a family tie. His wife was the closest friend of my wife's aunt, who passed away last year, and was very helpful to her in her last days. So, in short, I respect both men.

That said, my analysis of the connection between historical legacy and contemporary politics in Russia falls somewhere between their views, but probably closer to that of Pipes. The authoritarian and paternalist strains in the Russian political and economic cultures, respectively, complement each other and do constitute an obstacle to Russian democratization today. The hopes of the late 1980s and early 1990s rested on the establishment of democratic institutions. Institutions do not eliminate culture, but over time they can transform it. The desire to establish democratic institutions itself was evidence of some change in Russia's authoritarian culture already. That desire for change was based in large part on the obviously correct belief among some among the elite (and in society at large) that the Soviet totalitarian model was not a success. However, this view was not held by a majority and perhaps not even by a plurality of elites and masses. The largest cohort seemed confused. The remainder were approximately evenly divided into two groups, one which sought anew authoritarian model and those who backed Russian democracy. The problem was achieving enough economic success early on in order to sustain and even strengthen the democratic wing. This failed for various reasons. Now a portion of the elite who was never enthusiastic about the changes of the late 80s and90s have come to power, and they are consciously weakening but not fully eliminating the institutions of democracy. This means that in so far as institutions provoke cultural change, that change will be slowed and may have already come to a halt or been reversed. While there are other factors that can bring about cultural change, the more democratic institutions are weakened, the more democratic-oriented cultural change will be weakened or reversed. When this is added to the blow to democracy's legitimacy among Russians dealt by privatization and much else in the Yeltsin era, the prospects for democracy seem in some considerable peril. To be sure, there is a much economic activity and exchange on a small scale in Russia today that goes very much unnoticed and which is building in society some of the inter-personal trust needed to overcome traditional Russian paternalism. However, the political side of matters is more directly relevant to democracy-building than is the economic, and here as noted there is little to support democratization.

Much rests in Putin's hands under the new soft 'stealth' authoritarianism. He has promised further democratization. But as was stressed in the late 1980s, the gap between word and deed must be overcome....and soon. For example, Putin's dismantling of the Yeltsin era's weakly institutionalized but nevertheless important federative mechanisms, combined with the growing national self-identity among Russia's minorities, especially Muslims, is provoking a slow but sure growth of enthopoliticization and even nationalist radicalism. The Ingush role in the Chehchen incursion into Ingushetia is but the first serious reflection of this mobilization. Developments in Tatarstan and Bashkortostan are also moving in the wrong direction, and political risk assessments better start taking note of this nationality factor, the broken promise of internal self-determination for the national republics, and Russia's growing Muslim challenge. In sum Russia is far from a consolidated state and much further from a consolidated democracy than it could be 13 years on.

These developments should be of a concern equal to that regarding international terrorism. Indeed, any separation between the issue of international terrorism, on the one hand, and destabilization and de-democratization in Russia. De-democratization willlead to de-stabilization sooner or later, and destabilization will render Russia's nuclear, chemical, and biological materials more vulnerable to, andmore desired by international terrorists, who have infiltrated the Chehchen separatist movement. It is not outside the realm of possibility that a netowrk of various ethnic Muslim organizations could develop in Russia. Russia's prospective al Qaeda would be operating in a society rife with corruption and rich criminalized groupings. President George Bush would do well to 'securitize' his arguements encouraging Putin to re-democratize and state-building in Russia as elsewhere must become a key component of US diplomatic and intelligence work.

Gordon Hahn, GordonHahn@fulbrightweb.org
Independent Scholar