Translated material
Everything is one
Lev Gudkov, Boris Dubin
Life has become worse for Russian society, life has become more boring
Life has become worse for Russian society, life has become more boring
( Valery Vasiliev )
Data from VTsIOM surveys in the second half of the 90s on various areas of life in Russian society seem to have begun to form a certain picture in recent months. Its main characteristic is the increasingly obvious, consistent and unambiguous elimination of social diversity. This fading is most noticeable in the political sphere (it is also more visible than others), but the same can be said about any other area of public existence. In fact, on today's scene there are no independent social forces, communities, or groups representing and defending their interests. Any independent politicians and, in general, authoritative in their field and in the country, humanly great personalities who could act as equal partners of the authorities, be its open opponents, put forward serious ideas, defend principles, and give an authoritative and qualified examination of what is happening have disappeared.
The very level of society's discussion of its own problems - in the Duma, at public round tables, in the means of communication - has sharply decreased. Hence the massive transition of Russian citizens, starting from the mid-90s, to entertaining, light television programs - old Soviet films and Russian detective series, pop concerts and performances by comedians, crime chronicles, programs about health, home and family: the audience of their fans today numbers from one-third to three-quarters of the country's adult urban population, including not only nostalgic retirees, but also young city dwellers. So whether VTsIOM asks questions about “heroes of the year,” about social institutions or about individual political figures who are trusted by the population of Russia, over the past year there has been practically no one next to the figure of Putin - or opposite him.
However, the beginning was made by the first Russian president, who gradually severed ties with the few, but most qualified groups of the educated stratum, pro-reform oriented specialists (starting with Gaidar and his team), the then new candidates for public leaders (Stankevich, Boldyrev, Shokhin, etc. ). Gradually, “competitive” forces and figures were removed from the area of general attention. But previously they were overestimated by public opinion, the media, and politicians from the highest echelons of power in a sharply negative way - this is how chimerical doubles of public politicians absent from reality took shape, who took on the appearance of an underground “mafia”, behind-the-scenes “oligarchs”, etc. The vocabulary of social change, words about reforms, about a “normal” (according to Western models) society, the global context, etc., disappeared from the language of the authorities, and then the social elite - the intelligentsia. Today there is not a single distinguishable, authoritative group, force, layer in society that would define itself in such words and, more importantly, would link its own destiny with the corresponding processes (the proportion of people who started their own business has not changed throughout all post-reform years and remains still extremely low - less than 4% of the adult population). Over the second half of the 90s, the absolute majority of Russian citizens showed - beyond the narrow framework of purely tactical adaptation and survival - that they did not want to live differently. And it’s not even a question of whether it’s better or worse, but simply different.
“The West” has also ceased to be any kind of independent figure for the Russian public consciousness. The meanings of this generalizing authority - both real and imaginary - were also rethought in a negative way. An old tradition dating back to Pushkin’s, if not Peter’s, times also played a role here: turning away from the West as soon as it begins to criticize Russia (such double standards are an important mechanism for passive adaptation to difficult circumstances, avoiding real choice and independent action ).
The tangible differences between different social groups, between parties and individual politicians who undertake, or rather, who undertake to represent their interests in one way or another, have today practically disappeared. There is no party system as such in the country now. This was fully demonstrated by the recent presidential elections. All the opponents of the main candidate received fewer votes than in the previous ones, and there was no talk of any third force, like Lebed, who gathered an eleven million electorate in 1996. On the contrary, in an effort not to miss the opportunity to join the victorious government, 12% of yesterday's communists, almost 40% of former Yabloko members, more than 40% of Eldepeerites, over two-thirds of the "rightists" and 70% of OVR supporters - not to mention almost all of the "Unity" - voted for Putin.
The main figure of the political and social scene has become a demagogue politician paired with a “pragmatic”, or even simply cynical PR technologist who creates his image. The political and, more broadly, social situation today is such that the problems of values, goals, alternative ways of moving society, real changes in the country have been replaced by “working” issues of concentration and retention of power, and, accordingly, by the tasks of political technology, providing this power, when necessary, with maximum and undifferentiated support.
The structure of the political field now looks as if no political institutions and independent forces in society (an independent parliament, various parties, competent and authoritative means of communication) exist. Even those who remained on stage, political figures like Stroev or Seleznev, Nemtsov or Yavlinsky, are now the same “shadows” of themselves, their yesterday’s roles and ambitions (see Table 1 ).
Who else?
Addition one: designated hosts. The degeneration of forms and functions is a general, perhaps the main social process today in Russian society, its proto-institutions, its quasi-elites. We are still dealing with the processes of disintegration of the previous social system, the erosion of the very principles of its organization. They go in different areas, act in different directions, but together they work for one thing. The social relief becomes flatter, the level and composition of public life, the scale of its landmarks averages out (among other things, due to the fact that some, one might say, crouched down, while others stretched out on tiptoe). There are no new public figures (see Table 2 ). The shallow political and public podium was filled exclusively by the remnants of the Soviet nomenklatura of the last draft. Mass confusion, catastrophic moods, and then growing xenophobia among the educated strata of civil servants (people with “floats”), orientation towards the symbols and prestige of the state, a reanimated complex of Russian exceptionalism, etc. showed that this contingent performs no other professional functions outside of serving the authorities I can't.
Characteristic in this sense is the return to the forefront of former Soviet institutions from the category of the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Press. However, this trend is not limited to yesterday's state monopolists. Its social meaning is also much broader. We are talking, potentially, about the public approval of such a figure as the owner of the resources allocated to him, appointed and legitimized by the highest authority ("authorized") - be it natural, economic, communication and others. In this regard, it is probably worth considering the “voluntary-forced” influx of new members into the Volsky Union of Entrepreneurs, which, we recall, at first united exclusively “red” directors of the former defense industry, and then for a while disappeared from the field of general attention. In this light, the proclaimed centralization of power and the strengthening of the executive vertical must be understood in such a way that for each section of the social field there is assumed to be more or less one owner, controlled by the top authorities and to one degree or another - and sometimes exclusively - dependent on them. This, of course, is not a partner of the government, it is its servant. Such characters are not the elite. The elite, firstly, is independent, which is why it sets models and guidelines for behavior; it does not receive “instructions” from others and does not play along with them. Secondly, the elite is reproducible, which is what distinguishes it from the heroes of fashion and people of chance (reproducing does not mean multiplying - for that, who lacked the intelligence; no, it reproduces authoritative patterns of its own actions and assessments).
The point is not only in attempts to nationalize society from above (which, by the way, is not limited to the political sphere). No less desire to monopolize their plot is demonstrated by various kinds of self-organized “from below” unions and associations - for example, the organizing committees of all-Russian awards that are multiplying before our eyes: it is significant that they are now increasingly all-Russian, and not, for example, individual publishing houses or professional communities. A very recent initiative that is characteristic in this sense is the “National Bestseller” award with its own organizing committee and Grand Jury. It would seem, what does the jury have to do with it if we are talking about a bestseller? Collect data on book purchases from the computers of the largest stores and collectors - that’s the whole conversation. But the proto-nomenklatura structure will remain out of action, and public rituals will have to be dispensed with. And how then can we legitimize the figure of another “technologist” with his also very aggressive strategies of all kinds of promotions - a PR man from culture, who has recently laid claim to almost the main place in the cultural space? Nowadays it is increasingly virtual (in the sense of electronic), but this in no way diminishes the reality of its “lowering” impact. Rather, it’s the other way around: let’s say, citizens trust today’s television less and less, they grumble at it much more often, but they watch it more and more and would like more and more.
Addition two: those who find it difficult to answer. Another, also not very new, social character today is the “person who doesn’t know” (in terms of sociological questionnaires, “he who finds it difficult to answer”). This is not at all a formless “mass”; one can trace how this contingent is formed and transformed. A significant part of it consists of groups that during the 90s became disillusioned with the ideas and symbols that they supported yesterday ("perestroika", "reforms", "West"). At first, they manifest themselves precisely in the refusal of certain answers: this is the first phase - alienation from positive assessments of the present. Then they drift towards those groups least provided with any resources (older, less educated, low-income), who, due to their social status and scarcity of symbolic resources, were the first to give negative assessments of the current situation, the future, or adhered to them from the very beginning.
With such diffusion, such assessments lose certainty and awareness. They form a common negative “horizon” of expectations. In the next phase, this kind of unspecified, “wandering” discontent creates the value preconditions for the emergence in society - in contrast - of ideas of a “firm hand”, establishing “rigid order”. And accordingly - to justify emergency measures, a state of general mobilization, and strengthening isolationist sentiments.
So, for example, the euphoria of the late 80s - early 90s in relation to the West that suddenly opened up at that time gave way to confusion, and then a negative revaluation of almost everything Western, including the motives for Western assistance to Russia (see Table 3 ). Even later, after a sharp outbreak of Americanophobia surrounding the events in Kosovo, the negative attitude passed into a passive phase. But at the same time, it was latently transformed into a positive affirmation of Russia’s “special path” - a craving for consolidation around the uncontested symbols of “one’s own,” be it a “leader” or a “path” (see Tables 4, 5 ); It is characteristic that in Putin’s electorate (according to the voters themselves, it is rather pro-reformist), the idea of a “special” path for Russia is supported more often than on average.
Carriers of such consciousness are very sensitive to the figure of the “winner” and constitute a potential asset for those who are the first to rush to join him. Thus, they overestimated their non-participation in voting after Putin’s victory (38% of those who did not come to the elections after the results were announced admitted that they would now vote for the winner); the same thing happened with the approval of the anthem after its adoption by the Duma (before that it was supported by 46% of respondents, after - 75%).
Persona...
Personification of politics (when the active figures and forces are not groups and institutions of society, but chairs in the hierarchy of power and the persons occupying them), as a rule, is accompanied in society, in the mass media, and in public language in general by the division of the semantic world according to the principle of “we” and “they”, and accordingly the creation of images of the “enemy”, demonization of “traitors”, etc. Such simplifications facilitate psychological “unloading” for the mass consciousness, including the consciousness of the “disillusioned” (the basis here, of course, is not psychology at all, but quite clear sociology). Thus, with the help of the double standard of assessment, which has already been mentioned, a temporary displacement of the tensions that the majority of our citizens, including the educated class, traditionally experiences in relation to the authorities is ensured.
For example, Russian public opinion has maintained a very high level of demonstrative trust in the current president throughout the last year (70% approved of his activities in November), although his policies and their real successes are rated extremely low (about half of the respondents believe that the economic situation in the country , nothing has changed for the better in the standard of living).
In this case, the “blame” is transferred to the “government” - 46% of respondents do not approve of its activities (in other cases, the scapegoats are the local authorized representatives of the president, “generals”, “bureaucrats”, etc.). Another double standard is the separation of assessments of what is happening in relation to “oneself” and “the country.” The respondent assesses the situation of his own family and the situation in the place where the family lives not only more realistically (after all, he knows them from experience, and not from TV), but also more positively, thereby increasing self-esteem by praising “his swamp.”
We emphasize that all the processes mentioned above took place and are still going on against the backdrop of the persistence and even growth of citizens’ distrust of all institutions of Russian society, with the exception of the simplest in social terms and the least modern in terms of behavior patterns and social roles. Such an exception - this is the pole of maximum trust in the public opinion of today's Russia - were authoritarian power structures (the army, security agencies - 35% trusted them in September) and diffuse, quasi-moral authorities, symbols of an unstructured community "all as one" - the Russian Orthodox Church represented by its hierarchs (39%).
So, what is striking for many experts and simply outside witnesses is the trust of Russian people in the president - this is their inverted distrust of other public structures, authorities and figures. It was created exclusively from negativity, on the principle of denying what is unwanted, incomprehensible, and beyond the control of people’s efforts - their rejection of the growing disorder in the economy, the farce in politics, the bloody nonsense in Chechnya.
On the contrary, there is still no connection between the positive program, meaningful ideas and goals of the main political figure in the country and the interests of large social groups. Just as most people have no real positive successes, which means there is no reliable basis for their respect for themselves and their country (only against such a depressing background can a game of symbolic spillikins like the anthem seem effective).
At the same time, the mass of the population consistently minimizes their demands and moves again to increasingly simpler (in terms of semantic composition, value content) patterns and models of behavior. Passive adaptation, conservation of the remnants of the previous way of existence, survival as the norm of life, habit and orientation towards what is already known, repeated as the only guarantee of “sustainability” predominate. It would seem that we are faced with purely reactive forms of negative self-determination. However, further, in the course of consistent simplification, such feelings of inaccessibility to any worthy goals, symbols of one’s own weakness, are translated into a positive plane. They are combined with amorphous images of the national whole (“the people”), an equally vague type of “special, our man,” metaphors of an exceptional fate, the “Russian way.” So they take on the form of significant human qualities, the aggregate properties of a people, vague moral assessments: “simplicity” (versus any “complexity”), “collectivism” (versus “selfishness”), “long-suffering”, “readiness to sacrifice” (versus “activism”) "), "spirituality" (versus "sharefulness"), etc.
Manifestations of neo-traditionalism are becoming stronger among the masses (see Tables 6-9 ). In the media - especially during the "holidays" - a whole masquerade of national virtues unfolds. There is a reassessment of events, figures and symbols of the Soviet era, retouching of facts and heroes of the Brezhnev period. And all this, in turn, temporarily supports and, at the very least, glues together the disintegrating central institutions of the previous government (law enforcement agencies, nomenklatura vertical) and forms of communication characteristic of a “closed” society (“telephone law”).
... and mass
It may be said that the described social order meets the current mass expectations of Russian citizens. This is largely true. In July 2000, 60% of 1,600 respondents across the country believed that the problems facing Russia could now be solved by “the concentration of power in one hand” (only 27% linked the solution to these problems with the independence of all branches of government). And yet this is only partly true. Thus, 36% of citizens in September 2000 believed that since Putin came to power, politics has become less open, that behind-the-scenes intrigues prevail in it today (in April, 26% shared this point of view), 34% - that the struggle between different political forces is only has worsened (24% thought so in April); 44% - that an atmosphere of fear, tension, and suspicion reigns in the country (in April - 24%).
In August, every second of the citizens surveyed agreed that “the population is already tired of waiting for some positive changes in our lives from V. Putin.” The president's indecision in the first days after the news of the Kursk submarine disaster was assessed very negatively. Since the fall of 2000, the position “hasn’t changed” has clearly prevailed in mass assessments of all aspects of society’s life. In October, two-thirds of citizens were already concerned that the president did not offer “any program” to society, four-fifths were concerned that he was “bogged down” in the Chechen war, and so on. In the same October, 47% admitted that opposition to Putin and his government was necessary (29% considered such opposition unnecessary).
The programmatic dead end, the absence in the country of positive ideas and goals of real social change, the loss of society’s social form (one might say, its “massification”, and in many respects according to the Soviet model), on the one hand, makes necessary new and new rounds of emergency mobilization for due to xenophobia and fear, each time more and more dispersed and weak, and on the other hand, it causes extremely rapid “fatigue” of the human material. Intimidation is turning out to be an increasingly less effective means - people get used to any “emergency”. At the same time, the anti-mobilization potential - passive adaptation, reduced demands, focus on maintaining a minimum standard of home life - accumulates in the most peripheral groups of society, among Russians with a low level of education, residents of small towns and villages, pensioners, apolitical people, etc.
In other words, no reasonable forces or operating mechanisms are visible in the Russian public sphere. And in this, with all the assurances of stability from above and the readiness to believe them from below (this game has also been familiar to us for decades!), lies the unreliability and fragility of the entire current political and social structure.