Syndrome "Old Man Lukashenko"

Alexander Lukashenko won for the third time in the presidential election in Belarus. According to the Central Election Commission, he gained 82.6 percent. The opposition claims that the Old Man did not manage to win in the first round, gained, according to Exit Polls, no more than 45 percent, and, therefore, the legitimacy of his mandate in question. Observers note that 60 percent of all voters in rural areas voted ahead of schedule, and in the country, 30 percent were fired until an official election day. How voted, where they voted, why they voted ahead of schedule and whether these same leaders of voting production voted - a secret. Nevertheless, no matter what the opposition, the OSCE and the European Union say there, it is clear that most citizens of Belarus spoke out for the status quo. Well, democracy triumphed? And the Belarusian people, following the logic of some of my colleagues according to the “daily magazine”, demonstrated that he is “dark and terrible”, and nothing but a bowl of a soup and a gear subsidized by the Belarusian state, again subsidized, does not want to, doesn’t he need freedom, right? No, not so.

In fact, 82.6 percent officially recruited by Lukashenko speak exactly the opposite. Namely: that there is no democracy in Belarus and close. Numerous studies conducted in many countries of the world show: where the presidents are re -elected with more than 70 percent of the votes cast for them, there is no mention of any political competition, which means there is no democracy. For no matter how homogeneous society (ethnically, religiously, etc.), it always contains a polyphonic interest of interests and views. Let's say a flat tax scale is beneficial to rich, but not beneficial to the poor - less budget revenues and, therefore, worse social programs. State assistance or protection of national agriculture from imports is beneficial to farmers, but not beneficial to customers in cities - products are more expensive. Even in countries where there is an established two -party system, that is, a system where a large number of interests are aggregated inside the same party, leaders are the future presidents (we are talking about the presidential republics) at best 55–60 percent of the vote. (The exception is the countries that are in the conditions of obvious or virtual war, as recently in Iran or Russia in 1999–2000, when the second Chechen war used as a mobilization resource was provoked.) The reason is simple: people are able to negotiate parking tax in the city of N or not to enter, increase taxes in the city budget or not increase, open a new store on the parking lot of the park or leave The “green light” cities are untouched - to resolve such, quite specific issues, and referendums are held.

When the question concerns such a broad concept as “president” (someone likes the social program, but the views on tax legislation are not suitable, someone shares the “family values” of the leader, as it was during the last elections in the United States, but does not accept foreign policy and so on in the presidential republics, unlike parliamentary, the winner, as you know, receives everything), can only be supported by 80 or more percentage, only it can be achieved, only Clutching the mouth to all other candidates. In this sense, it does not matter how many candidates were included in the ballots - one (“candidate of the United Bloc of Communists and non -partisans”), as was the case in the Soviet Union, or three, five, ten. In order to give a voice to the opposition candidate, the voter needs to know at least how he looks, for which he acts, what decisions on the voter, voter, are going to accept issues. And besides, it is also sure that, put it in a tick in the wrong cage, he will not be taken away into the kutuzka. And if the voter does not know this, or if in one hand in power is a ballot box, and in the other-a criminal case for tax failure at a time when the dad is still a pass, then the only rational version of the will for him is to vote for the status quo. It may not be better, but there will be no likelihood that for him, a specific Mikola, and worse will not be - definitely higher than if he casts his vote to an opposition candidate.

But in order for the voter to find out what an opposition candidate can offer him such a good one, he needs to see this oppositionist on TV, and it would be good to see him exactly as much time as he sees Lukashenko (Nazarbayev, Aliyev, Niyazov, Putin). He must be able to learn something about the candidate’s program and compare with the one that the president already known to him for two terms declares. He also needs courts that would understand violations, say, in election campaigning (that is, they would ensure that the competition of candidates was built on equalized foundations) - and made decisions not by calling from power structures, but on the basis of collected evidence. He needs leaflets, posters, billboards - if he does not want to read the program details, but does not go to rallies and meetings, which means that the opposition candidate should have all this funds and access to funds from the opposition, albeit not equal, but comparable to what the current leader of the country or region has. In other words, so that individual citizens and businesses are not afraid to sponsor an alternative candidate.

It is also important for the voter to believe that his voice will not be stolen, the ballot will not be thrown into the garbage tank, and in return they will not put the same, but with a checkmark in another cage. And for this, observers are needed, and not like in Belarus, where only 1 (one) to 72 thousand observers represented the opposition, but so that the proportions were observed here. In short, the voter in order to choose from two or more alternatives, a lot of different things are needed, which in political theory are indicated by a simple word - a procedure.

In the heads of citizens there was a stable stereotype that there are two types of regimes: either - democracy, or - dictatorship. The dictatorship - we know this is when they plant. Democracy is when the people have the right to choose power, and there are more in ballots than one candidate. In fact, there are still a lot of things between these two poles: competitive authoritarianism, bureaucratic authoritarianism, regime of military-bureaucratic authoritarianism, and so on. And with all these modes, elections, as a rule, are preserved and more than one.

But democracy - in the modern sense of the word - is by no means limited to the right to choose power. Even in the days of Aristotle (and this, for a second, the 4th century BC), in the Greek Democracy cities, citizens feared what Aristotle called mobocracy-the power of the crowd, the majority who chooses the leader in the same way as the herd finds a watering house-in the wind, in the wind, and rushing there, trampling everything around. That is why the ancient Greeks selected especially worthy citizens in the assembly, which developed a circle of urgent issues and

Their discussions at the general meeting (“Veche” - in ancient Novgorod and Pskov) of the policy (that is, those who had the right to vote).

Since then, humanity has repeatedly had the opportunity to make sure that the right of a “big finger” (as the crowd solved the issue of life and death of a defeated gladiator) is a very dangerous thing. For the crowd is not citizens who consciously accept responsibility for the choice made and its consequences, the crowd is the element, the responsibility is splashed to everyone, and therefore - no one, the crowd is more moving in instinct than the mind: after us - even a flood.

That is why the term “procedural democracy” has appeared, the meaning of which: the board as the choice of the majority is legitimate only if the election procedure is observed, which is mandatory to create and finance (and not be punished) civil and political organizations, the contest of candidates, equal access to the media, respect of the rights of the minority, the presence of a arbitration judge (that is, courts of courts (that is, courts Verdict based on laws). This is the minimum without which to talk about the democracy of the elections and the presence in the country of the democracy regime (conscious and informed choice of the majority) in today's world is simply ridiculous. From this point of view, neither in Belarus, nor in Russia or normal elections, nor the democratic regime, there is a regime of bureaucratic authoritarianism of varying degrees of rigidity. It is no accident that the Kremlin endlessly plays the adjectives - “controlled”, “sovereign” democracy, the “special path” of democracy in Russia. The task is simple - to find verbal forms of legitimation of the regime existing today in Russia. They are looking for as they can. It would be nice if at least an educated class in adjectives does not play and does not call “democracy” that which is not in any way.

Favorite fun of the losers is to find guilty. The favorite fun of Russian liberals and intellectuals joined them is to convince themselves and those around that the Russian people are dark and terrible, cultivated in a thousand -year slavery, and therefore is not inclined to democracy and longing for the only big brother. And in general, as if it were glorious, if it were possible to move this somewhere-well, how Yeltsin suggested sending Berezovsky to a long space flight, with food and fuel at one end.

I will say a seditious thing: “The people are dark and terrible” everywhere - both in Austria, voting for neo -Nazis and in the USA, casting votes to man, who was explained in the categories of “Crusades” and “Oxes of Evil” for the whole first term. In the United States back in the late fifties of the twentieth century, in the southern states, including Virginia, through the bridge from the capital of the stronghold and the forge of the democracy of the city of Washington, there were separate bus stops - for white and black. And school buses were different - for colored and for white and on benches, signs hung: "only for the whites." By the way, today's America is not much better in terms of all kinds of prejudices. Just in the state of South Dokota (American Middle West), the last abortion was closed - unwanted pregnancy women will have to go to other states. And the southern Dakota is no exception, this is a trend that will most likely spread to other states of the extremely conservative Middle West of the United States. And in Boston, on the east coast, or in San Francisco-on Western, gays create families. In Texas and other cowboy states, Macho-gei began to discover himself solely after the release of the film “Gorbataya Gora”-it used to be dangerous, and in the state of Massachusetts there is a whole city of gays-a provincial, where a heterosexual person feels inappropriate and even strange. In the state of Aidaho, a woman in a deep neckline or with a bare stomach can appear only in a bar for lonely, and in New York there is two-thirds. Somewhere in Montana, come to church for Sunday in the trousers-to call the murmur of the entire community, and in Los-Ageles and shorts will not hurt anyone. And there are hundreds of such examples.

If American politicians tried to endlessly fake under the mood of the Middle West or Deep South, then, there is no doubt, no condoing Rice could never become the US Secretary of State, and Hilary Clinton could even think about running for the presidency. But the leaders differ from the extras that they do not follow the crowd - they lead it along. They convince, create institutions, change laws. In collapse, this is called principles. And they are either there, or they are not.

Therefore, the appeal to the "slave and dark people" is the appeal of the weak and the fearful. Not to mention the fact that this position is extremely convenient precisely in the conditions of the authoritarian regime: it opens wide doors for conformism. So in Soviet times, young people, choosing between membership in the CPSU (whose ideology they did not share and whose functionaries they hated) and dissidentism, chose the first - "so that it was not painful for aimlessly lived years."

There have always been a lot of excuses: “You can’t overdo it with a whip”, “There is no reception against scrap”, “I do not want to put my life on the altar of this dark mass.” Exactly the same arguments are given now, although they are clothed in more political correct words or amateurish research on the topic of “millennial slavery”. And therefore-it is not a sin to join “United Russia”, serving the appointment to the “Public Chamber”, participate in the next PR campaign of the Kremlin or take money for opposition activities from Vladislav Surkov. "This is not bad, this people are dark."

I do not condemn anyone - God forbid me, this is a personal choice.

I understand perfectly that the political cultures of Russia and, say, the United States are very different. But I also know that culture, with all its importance, is nothing more than a shell, as a wonderful anthropologist Clifford GIRTS, a “cobweb of importance” and - nothing more. People form culture, they change it. I already once wrote in the “hedgehog”, like the Germans in the early 50s, seven years after the end of the Third Reich and the country's monstrous defeat in the Second World War, answered the question: which regime is preferable for (Western) Germany? Almost the majority - 42 percent! - They chose the Third Reich, 45 percent - Kaiser Germany (the first world war), and only 7 percent preferred the Weimar Republic, in which the Germans learned about democracy, chaos, economic depression and the decaying system of power. The regime, then formed under the auspices of Germany, supported 2 percent. Here it is, the political scientists cried, unproductive, non -liberal, imperial political culture - there. Seven years have passed. In 1959, sociology recorded a directly mirror situation: 42 percent of the Germans surveyed noted the democratic regime of Germany as the most acceptable for the nation. According to another survey, 50 percent of the Germans indicated that "democracy is the best form of power." After another thirteen years, in 1972, 90 percent of the Germans already called democracy the best form of government for the country. And where did that German culture that gave rise to the Third Reich?

In August 1991, when the former regime collapsed in the country, the country - from Moscow to the very outskirts - slept. And Moscow - for the most part - slept. There were enough several thousand people, Rostropovich, who fell in the White House on the shoulder of the soldier - and the special forces divisions stopped, the tanks stopped ironing and the regime fell.

For centuries, civilization has been moving forward for centuries. And the crowd has been behind the leaders from time immemorial. But one cannot be considered a leader and at the same time - to feed from the owner’s hand, justifying themselves that "the people are dark and terrible." Which is. The trouble is in the leaders, they are not yet. Well, they won’t appear from moaning about the clogged people: this is not a potato that must be irrigated.