Furthermore, the central authorities are there to solve national issues. To ensure they can do this, they must have their own protected competence and sufficient resources, including a central budget. They have to be strong enough to ensure that “on the ground” the rules and order are kept; but they have to be sufficiently kept in check so that they aren’t tempted to “privatise the localities” and devour the competency of the local authorities.
But here an extra problem arises. If the central authorities are too weak, they won’t be able to hold the country together. But if they’re too strong, then they’ll overpower the local authorities and undermine them.
In order to regulate the power of the central authorities, and to ensure that they cannot break the established order by de facto seizing power from the local authorities, an artificially-created extra, horizontal, barrier has to be set up from within. This is to guarantee the separation of powers. This extra regulator built-in to the central authorities is federalism. In such an enormous country as Russia, it is essential to make sure that the balance between the centre and the regions is maintained.
Unfortunately, the very meaning of the word “federalism” is today besmirched by many years of Soviet propaganda.
Federalism is a specific way of organising state power, where along with the vertical division (the classic division of powers), there is an additional horizontal division, the so-called “constitutional deal”. This makes it possible for the two levels of state power to operate on one territory and, according to the established rules, for each to have full autonomy in one or more areas of competence.
The federalism that I’m talking about here has nothing in common with today’s false federalism. In the future, it will be an integral part of the metropolises that will be the centres of the new subjects of the state. But we need to start by changing the relationship within the boundaries of the existing territorial divisions of the state.
In the future, the metropolises will become the capitals of the “lands”, and will be granted all the necessary administrative and political attributes of local capitals, as well as the judicial system, the military districts and so on. The lands will have their own jurisdictions within the powers granted to them. It’s possible today more or less to predict what the list of the lands and their capitals will be, by looking at how individual regions are developing. They can already be prepared for their new role, including by purposely and systematically strengthening the existing subjects of the Federation.
Only an all-encompassing system will be able to survive in Russia, with a strong central government, a metropolis as a regional centre and strong local self-government. If one or other of the links in this chain collapses, or if the system flattens out and stops being all-encompassing, then it will inevitably return to the traditional authoritarianism, or run the risk of the state disintegrating into tiny pieces. The foundation of all three elements must be self-rule. And this must be defended by each region holding its own budget and being responsible for its own work.
The old model of Russia’s management is Muscovy, a country of a single city-state. But for Russia to become a modern state, the new model has to be Gardarika, a country of multiple cities that take power into their own hands. Gardarika versus Muscovy. Ultimately, this is the argument upon which the fate of Russia will depend.
Chapter 15. The Political Choice:
Democracy? Or a Return to the Terror of the Oprichnina?
If we stop to think about it, why do we need democracy? Why do we need this system of power based on regular general elections and the division of the branches of power? Why is it necessary in general? And why specifically in Russia?
The answer is far from clear. Or, to be more precise, it’s far from clear for everyone. The liberally-minded Russian opposition tends to believe that everyone understands that democracy is a good thing; and those that don’t understand this are just pretending they don’t. But this is a serious delusion.
Even in the most liberal of circles, you come across fierce anti-democrats who are convinced that democracy is merely for the chosen ones. And in the non-liberal sphere, where opponents of democracy dominate, not everyone speaks out on this topic, many preferring to remain silent. So the question as to whether Russia really should become a democratic state remains an open one.
The simplest thing to do would be to stamp “demo-scepticism” on this stagnation or lack of culture; but it’s much more complicated than that.
First of all, there are quite a few highly-educated intellectuals among the opponents of democracy; they’re not all just people who’ve been duped by the regime.
Secondly, there are plenty of genuine problems in the way modern democracy works, and these have discredited it in the eyes of people who have a wide variety of political views.
Thirdly (and perhaps most importantly), Russia has only a tiny experience of democracy, whereas at the other end of the scale its experience of authoritarian rule is huge; inertia has instilled into many people much more trust in this system.
And we have to remember that Russia is an atypical dictatorship. Russian authoritarianism is unique in its own way, and has never demonstrated any ability to modernise. Throughout its evolution, the Russian political system has formulated its own original answer to the challenges of history, which can be summed up as a permanent oprichnina. This system is not as primitive as many might think it is.
The essence of the oprichnina is the division of power into an external and an internal state, where the internal controls the external and is a hidden political force.
First established by Ivan the Terrible, the oprichnina has gone through multiple transformations. At different times this internal state has been called by different names (such as “the court”; “the Communist Party”; or the “‘Lake’ cooperative”). But in essence it has remined as it always was: while the regular state has existed, this oprichnina has been a network of informal power above all the usual laws and institutions, and one that hasn’t been identified by any laws. It’s the power of the superiors, standing above the law and living by their own privileges. It’s a specific kind of Russian “eternal Middle Ages”. It changes and constantly adapts to new circumstances, but never, ever, disappears.
The image of some magical force of this “Middle Ages” has become an integral part of the people’s historic memory, and people remember that any attempt to escape from this paradigm has ended with some kind of “time of troubles”.
This image doesn’t need to be helped by propaganda. It’s the first association that springs into the mass Russian political consciousness. So the renewed enthusiasm for Stalinism that many talk about today shouldn’t be regarded simplistically as just people being brainwashed by television. It has deep roots, not to mention that a significant element of the population retains sympathy for Stalin, and his methods for running the country survived even during the “riot of democracy”. Of course, this part of society didn’t always behave as aggressively and as shamelessly as they do today, but they haven’t changed their principles in the slightest.
At the base of this enduring sympathy is a belief in the effectiveness of Stalin’s way of ruling, especially when it was necessary to quickly mobilise limited resources so as to achieve a specific result.
A significant part of Russian society is convinced that Stalinism has great potential for modernisation, and this is a reality that cannot be ignored. Well before Putin appeared on the scene, there was talk in Russia about Stalin and even Ivan the Terrible as being efficient managers, but no one really paid any attention to it, dismissing it as nonsense. Wrongly, as it turns out. Here we need proper arguments, not emotions. For now there’s been more of the latter than the former.