Things are looking bad for Russia’s floundering “opposition”. I say “opposition” because the Western media has declared the Russia’s liberal forces–Yabloko, SPS, and Other Russia–the true challengers to Putin and United Russia rather than the real opposition, the Communists. Be that as it may. Apparently, pumping up small and insignificant parties is far more agreeable to the Western political establishment than giving credence to Zyuganov.
It’s difficult to measure whatever strength, if any, the “opposition” has in Russia. If today’s rally is any indication, it’s not much. The Other Russia rally ranged between 1000 to 3000 participants depending on who you ask. About an hour into the rally, a band of 200 National Bolsheviks waving black flags with hammer and sickles broke away and began marching. This gave OMON the legal green light to move in and bust the whole thing up. Moscow authorities only sanctioned a rally. Scuffles ensued but eventually armor clad OMONtsy encircled the “dissenters.” And to the tune of billy clubs rapping against their shields, they snagged the most vocal of activists and hustled them into an awaiting van. Limonov, Kasparov, Maria Gaidar, Ilya Yashin and 100 others were arrested. The four faces of “opposition” were on their way to present a complaint to the Electoral Commission office. According to the Moscow Times, they barely made it to McDonald’s.
All were released shortly thereafter (Gaidar as a Duma rep for SPS has immunity) except for Kasparov who was charged with resisting arrest and organizing an illegal march. He is expected to sit in the slammer until Thursday. Given the paltry turn out, Other Russia should be happy that OMON was there to make their march relevant. Without arrests there wouldn’t have been anything noteworthy.
Things looked no brighter in St. Petersburg. There about 500 Other Russia supporters gathered in defiance of city authorities. OMON didn’t hesitate to round up all the rally’s organizers including newly named SPS presidential candidate Boris Nemtsov and local party head Nikita Belykh. Both were released. Again, its a good thing OMON showed up because then the Financial Times couldn’t call their action a “crackdown,” the Moscow Times couldn’t declare the march “quashed,” and RFE/RL would have to find another verb besides “crush” for their headline.
The Bush Administration issued a statement condemning Moscow’s “aggressive tactics.” That should provide Channel One, which called Other Russia a bunch of “aggressive extremists” and provocateurs looking to brainwash pensioners in its coverage of the march, with more xenophobic fodder. Its seems that the powers that be love the word “aggressive.”
The march culminates several weeks of police harassment of Other Russia and other oppositionists. On Friday, police raided their Moscow headquarters with a mandate to search for “weapons, drugs, and illegal literature.” The first two were nowhere to be found (probably to the cops’ disappointment), but the police were nonetheless able to walk away with some “illegal literature”: 300 stickers that read “Vote for the Other Russia List.” Wow, scary.
If Other Russia is in a bind, Yabloko is faring no better. Forget the fact that police blocked their offices the morning of the St. Petersburg march. And forget that Yabloko Ivan Bolshakov was detained a few days before. The real signal to the “dissenters” is the murder of Farid Babaev, Yabloko’s chief in Dagestan. Babaev was shot four times, including one “control shot” in the head, in his apartment vestibule on Wednesday. The assassins’ whereabouts, of course, are unknown and probably will remain so.
Will the suppression of the Russian “opposition” matter to voters? It will certainly harden the belief among the already converted that Putin is no democrat. But for most Russians Sunday’s events are par for the course. According to a poll conducted by RFE/RL the government’s pressure is exactly what they expect. Putin and his people will ensure their victory either through graft, influence, or plain old violence. The fix is already in and Putin is holding all the cards. Or as poli-sci prof Vladimir Gelman told RFE/RL,
“You can compare the situation to a football match in which the result is known in advance, the referee completely favors one team that is the preordained victor, and the spectators are not even interested in watching or in supporting one team or another.”
Putin the spread buster must really irk some bookies.
Oddly enough, Sean, watching television makes it clear that the Kremlin is going for the SPS jugular — as little threat as that party presents to the establishment. It’s the Kremlin that is painting SPS as the evil opposition trying to bring the country down (see Putin’s thinly veiled reference to SPS in his speech to supporters Wednesday). The Commies, on the other hand, are taking no such lashings from the Kremlin or state-controlled television. Why do you think that is? I’ll give you three guesses.
I don’t know. Something about this coverage rings false to me, a little too jaded, a little too cynical and smug. Maybe it’s just that as a regular participant in actions (demonstrations, marches, sit-ins) that have gathered FAR less than 1,000-3,000 people, I can’t really dismiss this kind of political work as irrelevant. Also, as a historian, I often find myself studying small political movements and their impact. That said, I’m certainly not going to start throwing the Margaret Mead quote about “a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens” at you, because I’m pretty sure she didn’t have Limonov or anyone of his ilk in mind when she wrote that.
But this is the line that seemed too much to me: “Given the paltry turn out, Other Russia should be happy that OMON was there to make their march relevant. Without arrests there wouldn’t have been anything noteworthy.” What this analysis seems to miss, or occlude, is that I’m pretty sure that Other Russia organized the marches exactly because they knew there would be a crack-down. Other Russia isn’t so important as an actual viable alternative to the hulking ogre of Putin and United Russia, but rather as a means of dramatizing the limits of politics in a united Russia. I imagine that the marchers knew this, to some degree, and were still willing to put their bodies and freedom on the line. I doubt that they were “happy” about this foregone conclusion, but rather resigned and determined.
I’m no fan of Kasparov, Limonov, M. Gaidar, et al, and the Western-media darlings gambit can be annoying, but not to make some concession to the 1,000-3,000 folks who came out on this miserable Saturday, knowing that the fix was in (as you note), and aware of the possibilities of police and/or vigilante violence—let’s just say that it seemed less than generous to me.
Anyway, in sum, I agree with the tone re: Western media on Russian politics. But less so on the actual treatment of the marchers. Sorry for rambling. I am now prepared for attacks on my naïveté.
I really, really disagree with calling OR the “liberal opposition.” OR is 80% National Bolshevik Party, and is named after a book by Limonov. The NBP are NOT liberals. Victor Anpilov is not a liberal either.
Spot on about how the KPRF is the actual opposition — but since they’re Communists, they don’t count for Western commentary.
Also –
“The real signal to the “dissenters” is the murder of Farid Babaev, Yabloko’s chief in Dagestan.”
What reason do you have to think that Babaev’s murder was connected to this at all? It’s DAGESTAN. Not a hotbed of Yabloko support. It is however a hotbed of Wahhabism and gang murder.
Kudos to Buster’s comment!
Also, do better informed folk here think that the harsh OMON actions were sanctioned by Putin (or someone fairly high up there)? Or was this simply OMON being OMON? It seems to me that there is no need at all for Putin to crack down on such demonstrators. If anything, Yabloko and Other Russia gained a few more votes because of what the OMON did. Of course, not enough to make a difference.
I think it was OMON being OMON. I’m not sure Putin is even aware of the existence of the march.
(Other Russia doesn’t have any votes to get. They’re not a party. More of a tusovka.)
A few points:
I don’t have nay evidence that Babaev’s murder is connected to his Yabloko affiliation. But I can bet that many in Yabloko will read it that way.
Putin need not worry himself with unleashing OMON no more than Bush worries about sending out the LAPD to shoot at immigrants. Police already have violence wired in them.
Yes, Buster, my tone is how you read it. Maybe its old age. Maybe its having been to too many protests of not 1000 people but 500,000 and no real political power come out of it.
But I mean what I say that its the cops presence that makes this protest and any other noteworthy. Because its the cops that give the protest legitimacy. Without violence or the threat of violence Other Russia would have less a platform to say what they say. If the state ignored them, I’m sure Other Russia would slowly fade away since their anti-Putin message is all they have to offer. If one wants to see the real political struggle in Russia, tune into the strike at the Ford plant in St. Petersburg. I guess their lack of flamboyant leaders and Wall Street Journal commentators lessens their media appeal (the lack of a post on the Ford strike on this blog is a major omission on my part. I guess I’m also dazzled by the OR’s political pomp).
But I’ve been a critic of fetishizing protest for a while now. I think its a useless strategy. In this current period, I am an advocate of Gramsci’s “war of position.” Eat the state out by creating oppositional spaces rather than oppositional movements.
In regard to the future of resistance in Russia, the ball is in the Kremlin’s court. They should learn what the Bush administration has done in regard to protest. Either ignore them or subsume them into your hegemonic rule. See what Zizek has to say about this (via Simon Critchley’s Infinitely Demanding) in his new LRB article, “What to do about Capitalism”:
“These words simply demonstrate that today’s liberal-democratic state and the dream of an ‘infinitely demanding’ anarchic politics exist in a relationship of mutual parasitism: anarchic agents do the ethical thinking, and the state does the work of running and regulating society. Critchley’s anarchic ethico-political agent acts like a superego, comfortably bombarding the state with demands; and the more the state tries to satisfy these demands, the more guilty it is seen to be. In compliance with this logic, the anarchic agents focus their protest not on open dictatorships, but on the hypocrisy of liberal democracies, who are accused of betraying their own professed principles.
The big demonstrations in London and Washington against the US attack on Iraq a few years ago offer an exemplary case of this strange symbiotic relationship between power and resistance. Their paradoxical outcome was that both sides were satisfied. The protesters saved their beautiful souls: they made it clear that they don’t agree with the government’s policy on Iraq. Those in power calmly accepted it, even profited from it: not only did the protests in no way prevent the already-made decision to attack Iraq; they also served to legitimise it. Thus George Bush’s reaction to mass demonstrations protesting his visit to London, in effect: ‘You see, this is what we are fighting for, so that what people are doing here – protesting against their government policy – will be possible also in Iraq!’”
At the few protests I continue to go to in US, I hope and pray that the cops show up and exert their muscle. But they don’t. The symbiosis is complete in the US. I wonder if the Russian’s will ever learn that you can tolerate dissent, ignore it, and then use it to buttress your own hegemony.
One other thing. The only people I respect in regard to these marches are the NBP kids who split off knowing that the cops will come get them. Just like I love (and miss) the Black Bloc kids. They’re willing to do stuff that I’m not, like throw their bodies at the police.
Sean,
We are in the same blogosphere, because in an earlier draft of my comment, I had included a reference to Zizek’s comment as TOTAL HOGWASH, but took it out as an unnecessary swipe. Now, I see that I should have left it in. I know that Zizek wants us to reject beautiful loserdom and embrace some Leninist via Lacanian (avoid being the super-ego!) analysis… But I return to a more staid voice–the old anarchist common-sensarian Paul Goodman: when people start their analysis with Society with a capital S, get ready for nonsense. Zizek now seems to only do this. Instead, Goodman focused on building meaningful societies with little s’s, which Zizek seems to think is pointless in the world of big politics/big Society. Like Goodman, I’m not interested in that abstraction, but in actual people and real events. I would also reference *Seeing Like a State*, cause ultimately, I think that’s the (straight, big, ugly ND) road Zizek’s heading down. Are my syndicalist stripes showing yet?
Speaking of which, yeah, certainly that Ford strike is more tantalizing, though I have yet to see one piece of interesting coverage of it, which is why *I* haven’t been able to generate a blog post on it, despite trying to keep tabs on it.
With any luck, I’ll soon have you listening to better 80s music and returning to younger sensabilites.
p.s. Rhode Island protests still generate police violence. I can’t say that the Wobbly who had her leg broken in several places this summer looked forward to it. Let’s not romanticize TOO much, here, ok? There are details on this linked somewhere in my blog.
For all of you calling the Commies a legitimate opposition party, please remember that they have to make deals with the Kremlin behind the scene to make sure they don’t get the kind of treatment SPS is getting right now (or that they got in the 1996 presidential election). Zyuganov is quite happy to get his 10-15 percent, even if it comes in exchange for guaranteeing the Kremlin that they won’t criticize Putin too loudly. That’s what your “real” opposition is. Don’t fool yourselves.
“For all of you calling the Commies a legitimate opposition party, please remember that they have to make deals with the Kremlin behind the scene to make sure they don’t get the kind of treatment SPS is getting right now”
I would like some evidence for this claim.
Since this is exactly what Kasparov says about Yabloko.
Kasparov is right. And SPS does the same thing. But the Kremlin turned on them real fast. That’s why Nemtsov and Belykh are doing things like taking part in Dissenters’ Marches. They realized they wasted their time playing things quiet the past few years and making backroom deals with the Kremlin. It was all a sham. They just realized it too late.
This is not evidence — this is just a claim, backed up by no evidence.
do better informed folk here think that the harsh OMON actions were sanctioned by Putin
Is Putin going to speak against such actions? Not likely. In effect, that sanctions the police actions.
But I’ve been a critic of fetishizing protest for a while now. I think its a useless strategy.
That government largely ignore mass protests is a good thing, IMO. You only need look at France to see how well governance by street protest has worked. I wonder how long Sarkozy is going to be able to go along with his reformist plans before strike action and street protests force him to abandon them.
As I mentioned in a brief discussion with Wally on his blog, I think that the reason the Kremlin is apparently goping after the “liberals” and NBP rather than the Communists is that the former are seen as foreign- and oligarch-backed (except probably for Yabloko). Kasparov is after all campaigning not in Russia, where everybody correctly thinks he sucks, but in the United States. Moreover, almost nobody supports them, making them an essentially anti-democratic, elitist vanguard movement of scumbags (EVMoSs). The KPRF on the other hand is supported by actual Russians, large numbers of them.
Of course, the Commies had even more supporters in 1996, though that didn’t stop Yeltsin’s Kremlin from using them as a bogeyman (or fixing the vote) to make sure Zyuganov didn’t win. They went after the Commies then because they were a legitimate threat. The Kremlin has the Commies in its hands now, so there’s no need to make the effort.
It is not 1996, and Yeltsin is not in the Kremlin.
“The Kremlin has the Commies in its hands now”
I still have seen no evidence in support of this claim.
PS I think part of my testiness on this issue is because “so-and-so is a sell-out, and that’s why they’re not as radical as me” is a tried-and-true, and extremely annoying, accusation hurled about by marginal groups in both Russia and the West as a rationalization for their own marginality. (Spartacus League, I’m looking at you.)
It is an excuse for being in the best case incapable of winning actual support, and in the worst case of being a loony.
PPS. (one day I shall be the number one poster on Sean’s Russia Blog! Yessssss!)…
I think that the KPRF’s lack of current danger to the Kremlin is not because they are in bed with it but because — PUTIN IS REALLY, REALLY POPULAR. Moreover, all that stuff the KPRF campaigns on — reasserting Russia’s place in the world, increasing wages and pensions, etc. — United Russia
PPS. (one day I shall be the number one poster on Sean’s Russia Blog! Yessssss!)…
I think that the KPRF’s lack of current danger to the Kremlin is not because they are in bed with it but because — PUTIN IS REALLY, REALLY POPULAR. Moreover, all that stuff the KPRF campaigns on — reasserting Russia’s place in the world, increasing wages and pensions, etc. — United Russia HAS ACTUALLY DONE. Ergo, the KPRF electorate has gone over to United Russia. Putin represents prosperity and stability. Campaigning against someone who represents prosperity and stability is stupid.
The KPRF is using the rhetoric of the 90s, when it was campaiging against economic collapse and Russia’s falling geopolitical position. The economy is far from collapsing today. In fact, wages adjusted for inflation are more than double what they were pre-Putin. And Russia is clearly back geopolitically Thus, their raison d’etre no longer exists.
Damn double-post.
Chris, if you’ve ever talk to people in these parties — even senior officials — they’ll tell you about the necessity of backroom dealing with the Kremlin in order to get Duma seats. If you don’t have that opportunity, I bet a simple Yandex search would bring up lots of information on the subject. Try it if you have some spare time.
Of course party officials don’t say this publicly. Woundn’t be, dare I say, prudent.
I think Yandex would give me lots of unsupported kompromat.
A quick aside to ask about more pressing issues:
Where is MAB? Is she taking a break from her column?
Chris, yes, I’m hopelessly behind the times, but where do you get those smiley/winking/frowning faces?
I know not the whereabouts of the illustrious MAB.
You just tpe the faces. : plus ) =
Chris,
Here are a couple of articles on the subject. If still don’t believe this stuff happens, then I don’t know what to tell you. I can try and arrange a meeting for you with someone like Ryzhkov or perhaps a Commie or A Just Russia official. Let me know.
http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2007/11/3a194108-e754-4dbb-9795-009b4dbb0cf3.html
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2007/11/28/001.html
I didn’t say it doesn’t happen. I said, or perhaps meant to say, that the position of the KPRF etc. are not reducible to it, which I think is silly. (I do not trust either the MT or RFE/RL any further than I can throw a large donkey, by the way.)
I think I’m a bit low on the social hierarchy to get a meeting with Ryshkov. Plus, I don’t like him.
By the way, how does SPS’ positioning itself as an anti-vlast’ force gel with the prominent position of Chubais, and Gaidar’s line that he was poisoned as an anti-Putin provocation? This is not a rhetorical question.
What sources do you trust? Tell me, and I’ll pass on their coverage of this topic.
Ever since Putin dissed Chubais at the Valdai meeting, he’s laid low. And the Gaidar stuff happened before SPS realized it was wrong to trust the Kremlin for Duma seats. All of this stuff is out there. You just need to read. You can even choose your source.
What would convince you that Commies have to promise to tone down criticism of Putin and the Kremlin in order to get there piece of the Duma pie? What is that magical minimum amount of evidence that would win you over? Zyuganov and a group of geriatric storm troopers seizing Ostankino and announcing on Channel One that they are Kremlin stooges? Or should Zyuganov come over to your flat and tell you in person?
And what is that about “trusting” RFE/RL. As it relates to that Ryzhkov link, then you’re implying that you don’t trust RFE/RL to accurately relay Ryzhkov’s quotes. Or that RFE/RL made the quotes up.
What Russian politicians do you like?
Actually, I haven’t read the RFE/RL piece (yet). I take all media accounts with a large grain of salt, since they are usually (in the case of Russia) wildly partisan and full of zakazhuki on all sides. RFE/RL’s is famous (which is not to say it is necessarily wrong). I prefer academic reports (which can be partisan as well but are usually less so). I defintely do not trust Ryzhkov.
As far as Russian politicians go, for different reasons I like Yavlinsky, Glaziev and Putin, as different as those three figures are. And Zhirik, but qua entertainer, not qua politician.
It is no news to me that there is a great deal of “conversation” between the Kremlin and the various “opposition” parties — to some extent this is because of the “politics is a business” nature of Russian politics, and to some extent it’s just compromise, that is, politics tout court. However I think it is an exaggeration to treat them as if they were mere appendages of the Kremlin. A case in point is Rodina, which according to the conventional wisdom was supposed to be a subservient creation of the Kremlin. Things didn’t really turn out that way.
Anyway, the point stands that the main “problem” faced by the opposition is that their agendas are highly unpopular, either because they never were popular (SPS, Yabloko) or because Russia’s economic growth has cut the ground out from under the feet (the KPRF). The KPRF can’t mobilize starving pensioners because there are no longer any starving pensioners. The KPRF cant present itself as the “bulwark against the anti-people regime” because the “anti-people regime” has been improving the lives of the people.
While we’re at it, I wish people would stop talking about SPS and Yabloko as the two “liberal” parties. SPS is the “we love Pinochet” party of oligarchy and Yabloko are more-or-less European-style Social Democrats who actually have more in common with the KPRF.
Yes, but once Rodina got out of control, it was destroyed. So I’m not sure how that supports your argument that parties don’t have to have the Kremlin’s permission to survive.
You’re right about the main problem faced by the opposition. So why does the Kremlin feel the need to control them? They would surely discredit themselves if given regular access to, say, Channel One and Rossia television, no?
Anyway, it’s all pointless to argue. The Kremlin will continue to control television and who gets access to it, and all of these lame little blog comments will have no effect on anything. So I’ll stop after this post. Hail Putin. I have money invested in real estate in Moscow, so the longer he stays, presumably the better.
“You’re right about the main problem faced by the opposition. So why does the Kremlin feel the need to control them? They would surely discredit themselves if given regular access to, say, Channel One and Rossia television, no?”
I think they’re paranoid because of the experience of the unexpected collapse of the USSR, which they fear rightly or wrongly could be repeated in the RF, and correspondingly exaggerate the threat posed by various oligarchs abroad who like to boast about having financed Colored Revolutions.
“all of these lame little blog comments will have no effect on anything.”
Do not underestimate the world-historical significance of Sean’s Russia Blog!