What Kind of Russia?
President-elect Putin offers a basis for hopes--and for fears
MOSCOW--In looking at foreign elections, Americans tend to believe there must be a good alternative, an ideal candidate who will serve his country well and get on well with the United States. Bill Clinton has hailed Vladimir Putin, who won the Russian presidency with 53 percent of the vote March 26, as such a figure--someone who has said many of the right things about economic reform, the rule of law, and international relations. But in Russia, the picture looks more mixed. Putin's Russia looks likely to be what Fareed Zakaria has called an illiberal democracy: a nation that may move toward more economic freedom and away from corruption, but that also seems headed toward a prickly nationalism and away from freedom of expression, a Russia more hospitable to foreign investment but more hostile to domestic critics.
As an electoral democracy, Russia has made great strides. The vote count was mostly fair, and Putin seems in line with public opinion, a "mirror," as Jamestown Foundation analyst Elizabeth Teague puts it. He has been careful to avoid commitment on the issues. He set up a policy think tank in December, eight days after Yeltsin resigned in his favor and four days after the Unity Party set up by his backers won a second-place 23 percent in the elections for the Duma, far ahead of the 13 percent for the Fatherland-All Russia slate headed by former Premier Yevgeni Primakov and Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, Yeltsin's major non-Communist rivals. But think tank economist Vladimir Mau talks of little more than eliminating internal trade barriers and reducing "controls which are equal to extortion" on small businesses--worthy goals, but falling short of the guarantees of property rights that Russia needs. Putin owes much to oligarch Boris Berezovsky, whose ORT television network savaged Primakov and Luzhkov and championed Putin from October to December, and has few loyalists around him with any experience in national government. One can be hopeful but only guardedly optimistic.
The Chechnya effect. That seems to be the mood of those who elected him. Putin voters interviewed on Election Day in Klin, in the countryside outside Moscow, were quick to hail him as "young and energetic" but had little to say about what he would do, except to hope "he will make life better for my grandchildren." Interestingly, none brought up Putin's role in the military campaign in Chechnya, which was vital in raising his popularity last fall. Last September, four buildings were blown up in Moscow and southern Russia; Putin blamed the bombings on Chechen terrorists and launched the brutal assault on Chechnya. His poll ratings soared, while those of Primakov, under heavy assault from ORT, fell. Putin's Unity Party was launched, and as it swept past Fatherland and the market-oriented Union of Right Forces (SPS), both Primakov and SPS leaders Sergei Kiriyenko and Boris Nemtsov dropped plans for a presidential candidacy. The key to his victory was the elimination of those non-Communist rivals: Putin otherwise would certainly not have won a majority in the first round and was far from assured of getting into a runoff.
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