Russia is not free. That’s the conclusion Freedom House has made in its new report “Freedom in the World 2008.” According to its scorecard, Russia received a “6″ in Political Rights and a “5″ in Civil Liberties. The scale puts “1″ as the most free and “7″ as “not free.” The main reason the report cites Russia’s continued unfree slide was the charges of vote rigging in Duma elections this fall. You wouldn’t know it from the scorecard. Compared to last year’s report, there has been no numerical change in Russia’s freedom, or should I say, lack thereof.
Granted, I don’t take these attempts to quantify such philosophically weighty concepts like “freedom” very seriously. There is just something comical about such studies. Is it the reports’ crass reductionism? Is it how assigning measurement to freedom seems to trivialize its meaning? Or is it because by using such broad categories all differences between nations are obliterated? I can’t help chuckle at how efforts to scientifically graph abstract concepts like “freedom” only further obscures their meaning. What is left is Russia, as a “not free” nation, is simply the same as other “not free” states like Sudan, Congo, Angola, Burma, and Pakistan. At any rate, such is our age where everything can be reduced to a scorecard. Simplicity and comfort, not to mention terror and horror, is found in numbers.
Unfortunately, others do take Freedom House’s so-called “Map of Freedom” seriously. Since its birth in 1973, the report has served as a empirical yardstick and rhetorical battering ram for assessing the rise and fall of that ever elusive buzzword, freedom.
What does “freedom” mean for Freedom House? According to its methological statement,
Freedom House does not maintain a culture-bound view of freedom. The methodology of the survey is grounded in basic standards of political rights and civil liberties, derived in large measure from relevant portions of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These standards apply to all countries and territories, irrespective of geographical location, ethnic or religious composition, or level of economic development. The survey operates from the assumption that freedom for all peoples is best achieved in liberal democratic societies.
It should come as no surprise to anyone that Russia has never fared well in Freedom House’s tally. It was only in 1991 that the think tank gave the then ailing Soviet Union the mark of “partly free” for the first time. This honor was bestowed on the Communist state because the “Soviet parliament passed laws guaranteeing freedom of the press and of religion” (Christian Science Monitor, 1/3/1991). Russia has yet to get over the “partly free” threshold. That doesn’t mean it hasn’t come close. In 1997, Russia was listed as one of the countries that had made “significant advances” due to its “free and fair elections” for president in 1996 (Christian Science Monitor, 5/9/1997). Once again it just goes to show that being free is not so much how you elect as it is who you elect. Still, Yeltsin’s reelection wasn’t enough for Freedom House. It still considered Russia to be “democratizing.” With the war in Chechnya and organized crime serving as two often cited examples, Russia continued be “partly free.” By 1999, the Chechen War was dragging Russia further down the freedom meter as it was listed as the first of five “major setbacks for Freedom” that year. Nevertheless, many thought that freedom’s future in Russia looked bright. That is until Putin arrived.
Freedom House didn’t label Putin’s Russia “not free” immediately. It was only in 2005 that Russia was demoted back to the “not free” category. A good 13 year run at wading in “partly free” limbo came to an end. What happened? Freedom House then explained that Russia’s freedom decline was “due to the virtual elimination of influential political opposition parties within the country and the further concentration of executive power.” From there Russia’s decent into a “not free” hell has been gathering steam ever since.
‘“If you believe that driving is “voluntary” in the US, you are truly a buffoon.”’
It depend where you are. In Los Angelos yes — in Manhattan no.
It depend where you are. In Los Angelos yes — in Manhattan no.
Evidence is to the contrary, considering the number of cars in Manhattan. No doubt, there is more public transportation in NYC. So that 3% of the US population – they can theoretically opt out.
But the reality is, you still need a car to do any number of things or visit.
As to Kolya’s assertion – with extraordinary effort, you can find a way or a situation to live without a car in the US. It is still so close to mandatory as to be virtually so. People build cabins in the woods without electricity or indoor plumbing also – it doesn’t mean it is a viable lifestyle.
I remain firm on this – and in fact will reiterate that many jobs, if not the majority of them, will not hire you without a drivers license.
You also can’t complete required federal forms at the start of employment without certain forms of identification (driver’s license being the dominant requirement). You could complete that with a passport, but vast majority of Americans (93 to 80% depending on whose data you use) truly don’t have passports.
There are huge numbers of cars in Moscow, Paris, and London too, and they have great public transportation.
In general though you are right. In San Diego it took me 2 hours to get to work using public transportation.
W. Shedd, I disagree with you. It does *not* take “extraordinary effort, to find a way or a situation to live without a car in the US.” Otherwise, why do I know people who neither have cars nor driver licences? We probably move in different circles and, yes, my green anarchist friend (who lives in DC) is an extreme case, but not the other people I know. I agree that it is not common, but it is certainly doable if, for one reason or another, that’s your strong preference.
Although it was not directed at me, I primarily objected to your insulting overstatement: “If you believe that driving is “voluntary” in the US, you are truly a buffoon.”
Incidentally, when I lived in NYC (for a couple of years) I ended up selling my car (which I bought in Colorado) because it was such a pain to deal with.
You can do it in DC (I did), though it can be a pain. DC is very small though and has a good public transportation system by US standards. It must be a nightmare to not have a car in LA.
I did the no car thing in LA for three years. Buses and walking. It’s doable. But you need to have a lot of time on your hands, live fairly well located, and have all your work along feasible bus lines. Many people do it, but those who do rarely do it by their own choice. It’s usually because they can’t afford a car, gas, and car insurance. You don’t see suits on the bus. Virtually all immigrants and students.
But the point is not whether you can survive without a car. You can and people do, even in LA. My objection is to this idea that the reason why I do have a car is because I choose to. Yes, I can concede that it is a choice, but its is not one made vacuum that makes it solely an individual one, which Cyrill implies. Lots of factors go into the “choice”, many of which are not of my choosing or anyone’s. One thing about LA is that the organization of the city precludes not having a car. So what appears at first voluntary, really approaches mandatory.
My whole reason for brining up the driving thing in the first place is to note how the American state, like all modern states, uses this reality to increase its monitoring of its citizen’s and their movements. Some of these reasons are for benevolent and necessary; some are not. States can and do work for the betterment of its citizens and against them at the same time. I don’t know maybe I’ve read too much Foucault or something.
Kolya – I don’t know what to tell you, you really haven’t offered a convincing argument, just a group of hippy friends in Vermont (my friends and family in Vermont are in this category as well). That is really just a fraction of the US population.
I have a former room-mate who doesn’t own a car and rides a mountain bike everywhere. I’ll still see him sometimes riding around the area. He spends hours just accomplishing daily tasks that take minutes for most other people. He suffers numerous consequences as a result – everything from credit difficulties due to never having a car loan, to additional difficulties and hassles registering to vote. Most people can’t and don’t put up with those hassles. He still has to get a taxi or know a friend with a pick-up truck for many tasks.
In many situations, you can’t accomplish living without a car or license at all. Period. For example, God help you if you have kids and don’t have a car in America. You’ll be begging and borrowing a ride to every school or sporting event from about the age of 6 to 16.
Oh wait, your friends probably home-school, right?
I just don’t think you can cite those few people who make extraordinary efforts to not use a car as proof or practical evidence that driving is in essence, not voluntary for the vast majority of Americans. We have developed our entire infrastructure around the automobile, to the extent that life is very difficult without a car and driver’s license. To argue otherwise is to be a contrarian buffoon – just as I cited.
Don’t forget the social importance of having a car! In many social circles, not having a car = member of the rabble.
W. Shedd, once again, the only reason I sent that comment was because I found that this: “If you believe that driving is “voluntary” in the US, you are truly a buffoon”, is an overstatement.
I have no objections to what Sean or Chris wrote about it because they were much more nuanced. In other words, if for whatever reason you don’t want to have a car in the US or have a drivers license you can indeed live such a life and still be “successful”. Yes, that probably means that you have to live in certain communities (like NYC, DC, San Francisco, Portland, and many others) in which that’s possible. As I wrote, when I lived in NYC I sold my car because I didn’t need it.
As you noted, I live in Vermont and compared to, say, Nebraska, there are more people here with “alternative lifestyles”. But that is one of the points: it is possible to choose such a lifestyle. If you are sufficiently committed to a certain lifestyle, it makes sense to move to a place where such lifestyle is possible.
By the way, none of the people I used as examples live in Vermont. One lives in DC, my brother-in-law lives in Pittsburgh, and the third one lives somewhere in South Carolina. Of these three, only my DC friend does it for ideological reasons, the other two simply hate cars and driving. Compared to a typical American these last two may be peculiar, but they certainly did not go through any extraordinary effort.
Fascinating. This exchange really brings the concept of “freedom” down to earth, doesn’t it? For many — certainly in the US, and I bet in Russia too — car ownership IS freedom.
For what it’s worth, I despise the things and would love to have ‘em banned from where I live now (London). I had one in DC but not in NYC. For a time, 15 years ago, I was the proud owner of a tiny blue Tavria in Moscow but my foot went through the floorboard at some point and I had to junk it. Worst car I’ve ever had, by far, but it did feel liberating at the time. (Esp as the GAI tended not to bother me.)
It is telling how this discussion turned. The original claim that the USSR’s propiska was little different from requirement to have a valid and current address on drivers’ licences has been conveniently catapulted into a proxy you can’t live in US without a car. Whether it is possible to live without a car in the US is just as immaterial as a potential claim that having to pay for electric power is just as oppressive as being forced to obey propiska restrictions. Somehow a desire for convenience becomes almost equal to state dictate of where one can and can no reside.
Yes, we do not live in vacuum, but we also make decisions based on a pattern of life we choose for ourselves and it is hardly unlikely that people can cherry pick everything. You want to live in the vast plains away from city life, then your chances of doing it without a car are slim unless all you want to do is sit in a Montana cabin and send out mail bombs. But you can choose to live in Seattle like my daughter and not to have a car.
Driving a car is still a voluntary action. The state does not compel you to do it. Your lifestyle or your role expectations might force you to, but it is not the state that does it. For all I care someone still has a choice to move to South Africa and become a bush bum working in a game preserve. Or move to Santa Cruz where I live, bike to surf when its up and bike to your bus boy job at night. Chris here does not need to have US driver license with a valid current address. He can safely avoid CHP traffic fines by driving in Moscow. I could not ignore Soviet propiska and move to the US in kind. That choice was not available.
As for Shedd’s comment, thanks Kolya, but Mr. Shedd here had illustrated on numerous occasions a propensity to take disagreements personal so much so that now if my views insult him, I am inclined to take it as a compliment.