Sam Green: Is it afraid of the March ID?

The fatal vice of Julia Caesar - a mistake due to which his rule was interrupted, and the empire split into two parts - was not his despotism, but the desire to make the despotism eternal. Authoritarian rulers cannot learn this lesson - more recently, this manifested itself on the example of North Africa, before it could be observed in Ukraine, Serbia, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan and in other places. So in Russia, the regime of Vladimir Putin had diviners who warn that he should be afraid of the March ID.

On March 15, the Institute of Modern Development (Incor), the brain center of the liberal slope, founded and led by Dmitry Medvedev, formulated the political platform “Futting the Future”, clearly adapted for Medvedev. The report begins with a threatening warning: “At the beginning of the XXI century, Russia is again at a crossroads. But now this is not even between the directions of the movement, but between the future of the country and its absence. ” And on March 27 - on March 28, the press gained access to the report of the Center for Strategic Development (CSR), an analytical institution specializing in the economy and existing in state funds, which acts as the main government consultant. The report contained a call for quick full -scale democratization in order to avoid an impending catastrophe.

There are a great many reasons for concern, and history, as always, begins with the economy. Over the past 8 months of 2010, oil prices have risen by about 22%(the process continues this year), but, according to official figures, industrial production turnover has fallen by 6%compared to the previous year, the production of main products and services fell by 3%, and retail turnover decreased by 2%. This is not an economic catastrophe - in fact, the economy, albeit sluggish, but continues to grow. But this is not enough to maintain consent in the ranks of Russian elites, which so far existed due to the constantly growing reserve of resources for distribution and redistribution and turned the full-scale wars of the 1990s. In the "administrative" competition of the 2000s.

Oil has so far continues to fill the treasury of those entrepreneurs and elites who directly benefit from it, and those who received income through retail trade, real estate and boom in the field of financial services before the crisis have not yet been seen. But it is clearly visible how oil barons - the most influential of which, like Igor Sechin, also enjoy official support in one form or another - continue to strengthen their already strong positions at the expense of the rest of the economy.

Accordingly, the essence of the upcoming elections is not in the election of the new president, but in the consolidation of an increasingly rigid distribution of resources, as a result of which stable groups of winners and losers will appear, who, perhaps, will not have the opportunity to compare the score for another six (or even 12) years in a row. For many representatives of the Russian elite, as well as the highest and upper middle class, it is the fear of such certainty, the inevitable folding of capabilities, forces to overestimate their own positions. Let us recall how Pepsico bought a juice manufacturer-the Wimm-Bill-Dann company; Or as the investment company Troika Dialogue passed to Sberbank. The Russian State Agency for Mortgage Housing Lending recently reported a significant increase in sales of investment property purchased during the property of real estate in 2004-2007.

The population also feels it. According to the polls of the Levada Center, only 14% of Russians believe that the economy in 2010 is fastened and only 20% believe that it will become stronger in 2011; less than 40% optimistically evaluate their prospects in the next three years; 81% of respondents are concerned about inflation: in 2010, the government barely managed to keep its growth within unambiguous numbers, and it is good if this year its indicators do not exceed small two -digit ones. As a result, as the Incor and the CSR notes, confidence in both Putin and Medvedev falls. The difference in approval (approval minus disapproval) decreased to 34% of the president and to 40% of the Prime Minister, while respondents who believe that the country is moving along the wrong path, for the first time in more than a ten-year term, those who believe that it is moving in the right direction (42% to 40%).

The Russian ruling tandem can be glad that public discontent, perhaps, does not matter much - and not only because more than 60% of Russians would like to avoid such protests that have unfolded in North Africa against dictatorial regimes. The socio-economic situation in Russia (at least, minus the North Caucasus) is incomparable with the frightening situation that has developed in North Africa, and Putin’s rule, albeit firmly strengthened, is still far from the long-lived of Mubarak or Gaddafi. In essence, the CSR, although it notes fairly that the legitimacy of the tandem is sharply reduced, clearly overestimates the significance of legitimacy for Russian politics. Russian citizens have not expected for a long time that the rulers will report to them, and, with the exception of pensioners, they are relatively little counting on the services offered by their state. Actually, the very idea that the state belongs to “it”, and not the ruling elites, is not very rooted in Russia.

A real threat to the regime - as in the case of Caesar - lurks inside. Pointing to public distrust, Incor and the CSR expose fears that have already made their way into the ranks of the elite. This is what leads rich and influential people to exposure; What makes it possible for activists like Alexei Navalny openly challenged the regime, and the judicial secretaries - to blame their bosses of dazzling before the authorities; What begins to weaken the fear of failure, as the confidence is undermined that the stay in the system is profitable.

The strategy put forward by Insoor, which itself is a conglomerate of progressive technocrats, wealthy intelligentsia and relatively influential liberals, is a bold project, but it does not have a real electoral audience. The CSR, on the other hand, protrudes on behalf of the entire government economic bloc and expresses the many interests of the private sector that are represented in this block. Incor insists that Medvedev challenged Putin, and the CSR says that both should leave: only the third candidate who is not related to the current regime may, in their opinion, restore trust.

In fact, it may turn out that this regime is generally unable to restore trust, which, in essence, never had. As expanded online dishes show about these two documents, the public believes that liberals from the Iner/CSR and the regime itself are the same berry field, and believes that the system cannot reform itself.

Nevertheless, this is what is trying to make the regime, and even the liberals are afraid of what can come from the chaotic electoral process. Perhaps the Russian high -ranking pessimists will be able to bring the right people to power - by creating (with silent support of the state) of the new liberal party, which would participate in the elections on honest grounds and then the rules in the coalition with United Russia or even take the Kremlin following the results of the 2012 elections, but if these people are not ready to challenge the established balance of interests and to break off and break The destructive relationship between power and property, you will get another generation of well -intentioned Russian politicians who will not be far from what is happening now. And if this ends, then they will cause great harm not only to themselves, but also by the very concept of democracy in Russia, because it will mean that the hopes of their voters were not again justified.

Sam Green (Sam Greene) - political scientist and sociologist; Deputy Director of the Moscow Center of Carnegie.