SPEAKING FREELY The other historic event
By Andreas Umland
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As the world watched how Americans elected their first black president, Barack
Obama, it has been largely ignored that across the ocean another historic event
was taking place simultaneously in Moscow.
On November 5, Dmitry Medvedev gave his first presidential address to the
Federal Assembly, the two houses of the Russian parliament. In his speech,
Medvedev presented to Russian lawmakers an action plan which, if implemented,
could usher in a return to the policy of democratic reforms started by Mikhail
Gorbachev in the late 1980s and continued by Boris Yeltsin in the 1990s.
To be sure, Medvedev's speech was by no means a praise of the West and its
values. Rather, the Russian president started with an array of verbal attacks
on the US and gave vent to the rabid anti-Americanism that has become a major
axiom of foreign political thinking of both the common people and elites of
Russia.
Medvedev reasserted that Russia's recent activities in the Caucasus -
intervention in Georgia - were justified, and that the US is to be blamed for
this and other international conflicts - an idea that he, moreover, repeated
again when concluding his speech. Medvedev also announced that Russia may place
short-range rockets in the Kaliningrad region as a response to the installation
of US anti-ballistic missiles in Poland and the Czech Republic.
However, in the middle of his long speech, Medvedev also voiced a sharp
critique of historical Russian statism, and did not hesitate to hail the
adoption of the Russian constitution under Yeltsin, in 1993. He proposed that
"Russian democracy should develop further". In its first analyses of Medvedev’s
speech, the Western media tended to emphasize a couple of technical innovations
proposed by the president for the country's political system, such as the
prolongation of the terms of the president (to six years) and the State Duma
(the Lower House).
What was, however, more significant in Medvedev's presentation was the
outspokenness with which he condemned the Russian state apparatus's
interference in elections, mass media, civil society and the economy - all of
which gives, in Medvedev's opinion, birth to corruption in the bureaucracy.
In view of the many deficiencies of the post-Soviet political system, the
president announced a number of practical changes which, if implemented in full
scale, could signal the start of a new transformation of the nature of politics
in Russia.
Under president Vladimir Putin, the various official and unofficial alterations
of Russia's political system amounted to a centralization and insulation of
power in the Kremlin, which by 2007 had led to the restoration of
authoritarianism and a de facto one-party system.
In contrast, Medvedev made it clear that he wants to return power to the people
and to see politics becoming more pluralistic. Thus, Medvedev proposed that
smaller parties should have a voice in the political process, suggesting that
those parties falling below a 7% threshold in parliamentary elections yet
reaching more than 5% should in the future be represented with at least one or
two deputies in the Duma. (One suspects that this peculiar modification of the
electoral system is a result of a somewhat awkward compromise between Medvedev,
who apparently wants to make the composition of the legislature more diverse,
and conservative forces in the government who seek to preserve the high 7%
threshold. The latter was introduced only recently to secure the nearly total
control of the lawmaking process by Putin’s United Russia Party.)
Medvedev also proposed that only elected deputies should become governors of
Russia's regions or members of the Federation Council, the Upper House. He made
further suggestions to reduce the hurdles for parties to register and take part
in elections. Medvedev wants to extend the prerogatives of the national
parliament and local legislatures in relation to the executive, as well as to
include non-governmental organizations in the legislative process.
By proposing these changes, he apparently is looking for channels to bring
supporters of democratic changes into the legislative process. It is also
noteworthy that Medvedev spoke out in favor of a "strengthening of the national
mechanism of the application of the European Convention for the Protection of
Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms" - the major document of the Council of
Europe. By doing so, Medvedev affirmed Russia’s acceptance of basic European
standards and his intention to preserve Russia's membership in some major
Western organizations.
However, the most remarkable statements were made by Medvedev concerning
Russian journalism, the tight control of which by the state is, perhaps, the
most consequential pathology of Russia's current political system. It is
remarkable that the president not only acknowledged openly this fact, but even
showed some resignation concerning the firmness of the government's grip on the
mass media.
Medvedev proposed his own way to solve this problem: "Freedom of speech should
be secured by technological innovation. Experience shows that it is practically
useless to try to persuade bureaucrats to leave the mass media alone. One
should not try to persuade, but extend as broadly as possible the space for the
Internet and digital television. No bureaucrat can prevent discussions on the
Internet or censor thousands of TV channels at the same time."
While Medvedev's assessments and proposals are sometimes pathetic, they
nevertheless show that he thinks about the political system in much the same
way as many Russian political scientists and Western politicians. Obviously,
Medvedev will face enormous obstacles in implementing his vision for a
democratic Russia. Still, in formulating its policies towards Moscow, the West
should take due notice that the formally most powerful politician in Russia can
be counted on as a firm supporter of democratic values.
Dr Andreas Umland teaches at The Catholic University of
Eichstaett-Ingolstadt in Bavaria, is editor of the book series Soviet
and Post-Soviet Politics and Society (www.ibidem-verlag.de/spps.html), and
administers the website Russian
Nationalism.
(Copyright 2008 Andreas Umland.)
Speaking Freely is an Asia Times Online feature that allows guest writers to have
their say.
Please click hereif you are interested in contributing.
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