Nezavisimaya Gazeta: "Patriots at War"
What is Russia's future? Some want to make it more humane, while others pine for the late unlamented nationalist stoicism
Dr Putin the Psychotherapist
Many think that the Kremlin owes its consolidated power and dominion over the public to nothing but exorbitant oil prices of the recent years. But then, Vladimir Putin received public support even when oil went for $40 a barrel. He started as the President of Hope and a clever psychotherapist who would say nothing that might upset his patients.
A positive mood of the public played into his hand when he was first elected-post-revolutionary thirst for stability and firm rule after the chaos and defeatism of the early 1990s. The second half of the decade saw a mounting preference of statehood, however weak and inefficient, to utter disorder.
The ideology later known as "sovereign democracy" took shape in the late 1990s. The majority thought it was "a time to gather stones", and conservative patriotism overweighed the liberalism of the early 1990s, as many sociologists noted on the eve of Putin's appearance at the helm.
Torn apart at that stormy time, Russian society was groping for values to cement it. Liberals rose up in arms against state paternalism and patriotism as "the last refuge of scoundrels". Their cause, however, was doomed by post-revolutionary stabilisation, which inevitably revived fundamentalism and brought back a glossy image of national history. We see this in all lands and all eras, and we see this in contemporary Russia.
When the national state is not revered on one side of the barricade, the other side gets aflame with patriotic passion and longs to trample "those stupid liberals" underfoot for doubting the natural and sacred right to love one's Motherland. Self-styled patriots wage their war in conditions too comfortable to think about what matters most-the human face that a national state needs, however strong it might be. They never look back at the toll of lives taken by Russian victories. Worse still, they never care about culture and civilisation the reviving state should rest on. Putin promised at the turn of the century that "Russia would rise from her knees." At that time, it mattered most-"My country is my sole concern," as a popular song of the 1940s went. Too many found patriotism an unending source of stamina.
Admittedly, enthusiastic patriotism at the beginning of Putin's presidency did a great deal to revitalise the national mentality. Ethnic Russians were gradually integrating into the new Russian state. That was the greatest achievement of the Putin era. There was much talk in Boris Yeltsin's time about "government colonialism and anti-Russian policy", about "downtrodden ethnic Russians" and so on, and so forth. These allegations began to subside under President Putin. However critical of his rule many might be, it was regarded as the nation's own.
The victory in the second Chechen war did much to heal wounded national pride. It has receded into the past, however, and the public takes it for granted now-it is so human to get accustomed to achievements to the point of shrugging them off. Russians who followed Yeltsin grew to appreciate Soviet might only after the USSR collapsed. It can be said again and again that Russia should rise from her knees and that it possesses a precious cultural legacy-these beautiful words no longer set hearts aflame. Government determination to protect South Ossetia inspired many but they grew cool at the first mention of the billions of roubles necessary to restore Tskhinval.
Motherland, the Poor Man's Evil Stepmother
True, self-interest and grabbing are more pronounced in petrodollar-fattened Russia than in Yeltsin's poverty-stricken, chaotic country. The crux of the matter is elsewhere, however: If we dare paraphrase Jesus Christ, man does not live by spirit alone. The most sublime spirituality shrinks back before mass race for wealth. Public unrest brews not in the hour of trouble but when prosperity spreads and everyone sees a chance to obtain creature comforts.
The gap between the rich and the poor is yawning ever wider. Russia is a generous Motherland to the rich and a callous Step-motherland to the poor. It appears a miracle that Putin has cemented the nation at such a time round the idea of Russian independence and strength. Perhaps, he owes his success to the collapse of the USSR, which caused the nation greater pain than the bitterness of the destitute in a rich country. Still, there was hope for better future. Economic improvement during Putin's presidency whipped up patriotic pride. Russian football victories excited the patrons of bars and restaurants more than any other.
Now, unemployment is growing in small towns and metropolises, and many have lost hope that affluence would ever reach the backwaters. Naturally, the perception of private life and national destiny is changing fast. High-sounding words about duty to the Step-motherland do not reach the heart of a derelict. Russia owes its present weakness not only to the huge number of the poor but also to the fact that the majority of police and army officers come from poor and underprivileged families.
Are We to Invent More Enemies?
This is a hard time for Russians and their leaders. It puts the art of ideological manipulation among top priorities on a par with manipulating financial flows, at which the Russian leadership excels. At any rate, our leadership should see that patriotic rhetoric is as outdated as patriots' invectives. True, there is still chance to whip up patriotic passion by denouncing new enemies. One can fulminate not only against cosmopolitans but also against the opponents of walling off Russia with its unique values from the world. We should not forget, however, that the public takes no interest at all in verbal battles rending apart the swarm of patriots.
Objectively, the borrowing of ultra-patriotic catchphrases by penitent liberals promotes national interests. What is so bad, after all, about the entire national elite turning etatist? We should not forget, however, that educated Russians have a good memory. They feel aversion to recent partisans of the "world government" idea U-turning overnight to curse America. Intellectuals' hatred has spread from ultra-patriotism to the entire Russian ideology. Patriots have scored a Pyrrhic victory with the metamorphosis of public politics into a race for the reputation of the most effusive admirer of the state's iron fist. It is flattering to stand up for national dignity when someone has contrasting convictions. Patriotism is pointless, however, now that all have flocked round the patriotic colours-former opponents of the Soviet empire, monarchists, the Reds and Orthodox bigots. Their ideas of what is good for Russia clash with each other, rendering patriotism void.
The situation proves an old truth: Conservatism is intrinsically negative; it makes sense when opposing a challenge, let say, to national sovereignty, traditions, etc. Patriotism as an instinct of national self-preservation works against enemies. It is dormant or dying now that the entire Russian political and ideational life has degenerated into a tug of war for the title of the state's most ardent servant.
True, when enemies are non-existent, it is necessary to invent them. Is it worthwhile, however, when intellectual Russians have grown sick of television denunciations of "moribund America"? It is dangerous to keep the public in hysterics for too long-it may get tired of unhealthy agitation and turn against the country's top. This prospect is all the more probable considering the multitude of phobias that obsess the Russian patchwork subconscious, in which the fear of losing a strong state lives side by side with the horror of new troubles and upheavals.
Wanted: A Hero
The masterminds of the sensational The Name Russia television contest, with a public vote for past celebrities, may have thought that it would not just improve the audience's knowledge of history but promote patriotism. It was not by chance that the jury, headed by Nikita Mikhalkov, was made up of ultra-patriotic politicians and experts.
As I see it, the only thing the contest has proved is that patriotism is just a name now. The discussion on Stalin's place in Russian history revealed that even patent patriots' opinions of him were polarised. Sergei Mironov, the Just Russia party leader, said Stalin was the most bloodthirsty villain Russia had ever known, while General Varennikov, Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov and Dmitry Rogozin extolled him as the leader to whom Russia owed its might and who personified the nation's grandeur. By contrast, historian Andrei N. Sakharov and artist Ilya Glazunov, both also patriots and advocates of a strong state, said that Stalin continued Lenin's genocide of the Russian people.
The concept of patriotism becomes void when one nation endows it with mutually exclusive ethical contents. People who say they are patriots have contrasting ideas of national history, assessments of past victories, and expectations of the future. The realisation of such contrasts is the key to understanding the current situation. Russians have allegedly parted ways with Communism. However, we have only vague ideas of the future. Some deem it necessary to humanise every sphere of life while others call to revive nationalist stoicism and make countless sacrifices to glorious achievements made at all cost. We are in a vicious circle. Russia has returned to what it cast off ten years ago. It is extremely dangerous to take an ostrich attitude to that.
Arguments between patriotic Westernisers, known before the Bolshevik Revolution as "conscious patriots", and the advocates of the unique Russian way, which is known as "the Russian project" nowadays, are far more heated than the disputes of the early and mid-1990s between liberals and etatists. These arguments concern everything-the right to criticise Russian problems, the moral evaluation of Russian history and its notables, etc, etc. I do not know which is more dangerous for Russia as it casts off the dire heritage of the 1990s-the recent temptation of cosmopolitan dissolving in united Europe or the alleged boons of a Russian civilisation resting on grassroots values and walled off from the West. We should not forget that the idea of Russian uniqueness has always walked hand in hand with the extolling of serfdom, poverty and ignorance. The split of contemporary Russia differs from that of the 1990s-but then, there is no ideological consolidation to speak of, just as there wasn't one then. Writer Daniil Granin had a point when he said in his anniversary interview that new Russia had no ideology at all, and Russians did not know where they were and what made them tick.
A crisis brings graphic ideas and prompts quick and apt decisions. Ideology benefits from abstract patriotism no more than the economy from abstract liberal principles. It is time to humanise the "Russian idea" of the strong state, and show what Russia can give people here and now-not in the vague future, which is just another abstraction. Promises of prosperity for every family are even more groundless today than they were two years ago. Still, authorities can do something even now to enhance private safety, combat drugs, protect the environment and reduce brain drain.
Alexander Tsipko, PhD, Senior Fellow of the Institute of Economics, Russian Academy of Sciences.
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Intellectual Russians have grown sick of television denunciations of "moribund America".
Alexander Tsipko
