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Abstract
The beginning of Vladimir Putin’s third term was characterised by the politicisation of corruption. Opposition forces focused on corruption and criticised the regime for tolerating it. This article explores how the regime reacted to opposition criticism. The regime encountered a dilemma: it could not ignore the opposition but promoting anti-corruption reforms was risky for the regime. This study focuses on the regime’s use of the All-Russia People’s Front (Obshcherossiiskii Narodnyi Front—ONF) and concludes that it functioned as a ‘parastatal’ anti-corruption movement, enabling the regime to deflect the blame without directly involving itself in the process.
This work was supported by KAKENHI (Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research) Grant Numbers JP16H03575 and JP16K17058. I am grateful to the participants of the 2016 Winter International Symposium of the Slavic-Eurasian Research Center, Hokkaido University (8–9 December 2016), and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments.
Notes
1 Natsdem refers to those of liberal oppositions who are inclined more to nationalism.
2 In his Annual Address to the Federal Assembly on 22 December 2011, President Dmitrii Medvedev announced a series of liberalising political system reforms (Medvedev Citation2011). These included reintroducing the direct election of regional governors, softening the registration requirements for new political parties, and lowering the number of signatures required for candidates or parties to stand for election.
3 Although the movement’s name was changed to ‘People’s Front—For Russia’ (Narodnyi Front—Za Rossiyu) in June 2013, it continues to use ONF as its acronym.
4 For discussion of this dilemma, see Petrov et al. (Citation2014).
5 Ukaz Prezidenta ot 19.05.2008 N 815 ‘O merakh po protivodeistviyu korruptsii’, Rossiiskaya Gazeta, 22 May 2008.
6 Federal’nyi zakon ot 25.12.2008 N 273-FZ ‘O protivodeistvii korruptsii’, Rossiiskaya gazeta, 30 December 2008.
7 Federal’nyi zakon ot 08.06.2012 N. 65-FZ ‘O vnesenii izmenenii v Kodeks Rossiiskoi Federatsii ob administrativnykh pravonarusheniyakh i Federal’nyi zakon “O sobraniyakh, mitingakh, demonstratsiyakh, shestviyakh i piketirovaniyakh”’, Rossiskaya gazeta, 9 June 2012. The law introduced rules on organising demonstrations and set large fines for violating them. In addition, it made it impossible for the opposition to mount demonstrations without permission by the authority. For details, see Kuz’menkova and Tanas (Citation2012).
8 ‘Ezhegodnaya bol’shaya press-konferentsiya’, 14 February 2008, available at: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/24835, accessed 15 January 2017.
9 Naval’nyi and his brother Oleg were accused of embezzling money from two companies, including the Russian branch of French cosmetics company Yves Rocher.
10 ‘Chto kroetsya za otstavkoi Serdyukova?’, BBC Russia, 12 November 2012, available at: http://www.bbc.com/russian/russia/2012/11/121106_serdyukov_dismissal, accessed 15 January 2017.
11 For example, a new law on monitoring whether state officials’ assets were justified by their income was adopted in December 2012. Federal'nyi zakon ot 03.12.2012, No. 230-FZ ‘O kontrole za sootvetstviem raskhodov lits, zameshchayushchikh gosudarstvennye dolzhnosti, i inykh lits ikh dokhodam’, Rossiiskaya Gazeta, 5 December 2012.
12 The opposition continued to focus on this topic by referring to the problem of article 20 (‘illicit enrichment’) of the United Nations Convention against Corruption. For example, Naval’nyi launched a campaign ‘Za dvadtsatuyu stat’yu’ in 2014. See the campaign website, available at: https://20.navalny.com/, accessed 28 December 2018.
13 For an interview with Zheleznyak on this law draft, see ‘Zheleznyak: Imushchestvo za rubezhom delaet chinovnika menee svobodnym v svoikh resheniyakh’, 6 August 2012, available at: http://er.ru/news/88933/, accessed 15 January 2017.
14 Zakonoproekt No. 117971-6 ‘O vnesenii izmenenii v nekotorye zakonodatel'nye akty Rossiiskoi Federatsii (ob ustanovlenii otvetstvennosti lits, zameshchyayushchikh gosudarstvennuyu dolzhnost' sub''ekta Rossiiskoi Federatsii, lits, zameshchayushchikh munitsipal'nuyu dolzhnost', za narushenie ukazannymi litsami obyazannosti po predostavleniyu svedenii o svoikh dokhodakh, ob imushchestve i obyazatel'stvakh imushchestvennogo kharaktera, a takzhe o dokhodakh, ob imushchestve i obyazatel'stvakh imushchectvennogo kharaktera svoikh suprugi (supruga) i nesovershennoletnikh detei’, available at: http://asozd2.duma.gov.ru/main.nsf/%28SpravkaNew%29?OpenAgent&RN=117971-6&02, accessed 15 January 2017.
15 Zakonoproekt No. 120809-6 ‘O vnesenii izmenenii v otdel'nye zakonodatel'nye akty Rossiiskoi Federatsii v svyazi s prinyatiem Federal'nogo zakona “O zaprete otdel'nym kategoriyam lits otkryvat' i imet' scheta (vklady), khranit' nalichnye denezhnye sredstva i tsennosti v inostrannykh bankakh, raspolozhennykh za predelami territorii Rossiiskoi Federatsii, vladet' i (ili) pol'zovat'sya inostrannymi finansovymi instrumentami” (v chasti ustanovleniya zapreta dlya gosudarstvennykh sluzhashchikh imet' v sobstvennosti nedvizhimoe imushchestvo za rubezhom, imet' scheta v inostrannykh bankakh i tsennye bumagi inostrannykh emitentov)’, available at: http://asozd2.duma.gov.ru/main.nsf/%28SpravkaNew%29?OpenAgent&RN=120809-6&02, accessed 15 January 2017.
16 ‘Intervyu telekanalu Russia Today’, 6 September 2012, available at: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/16393, accessed 15 January 2017.
17 Zakonoproekt No. 220675-6 ‘O zaprete otdel'nym kategoriyam lits otkryvat' i imet' scheta (vklady), khranit’ i nalichnye denezhnye sredstva i tsennosti v inostrannykh bankakh, raspolozhennykh za predelami territorii Rossiiskoi Federatsii, vladet’ i (ili) pol'zovat'sya inostrannymi finansovymi instrumentami’. The original draft and schedule of Duma sessions is available at: http://asozd2.duma.gov.ru/main.nsf/%28SpravkaNew%29?OpenAgent&RN=220675-6&02, accessed 15 January 2017.
18 Federal’nyi zakon ot 07.05.2013 No. 79-FZ ‘O zaprete otdel’nym kategoriyam lits otkryvat’ i imet’ scheta (vklady), khranit’ nalichnye denezhnye sredstva i tsennosti v inostrannykh bankakh, raspolozhennykh za predelami territorii Rossiiskoi Federatsii, vladet’ i (ili) pol’zovat’sya inostrannymi finansovymi instrumentami’, Rossiskaya gazeta, 14 May 2013.
19 ‘Edinoross Pekhtin pokidaet Gosdumu posle posta Naval’nogo o ego nedvizhmosti za rubezhom’, Gazeta.ru, 20 February 2013, available at: https://www.gazeta.ru/politics/news/2013/02/20/n_2763413.shtml, accessed 28 December 2018.
20 ‘Vladimir Putin ne privyk razbrasyvat’sya frontami’, Kommersant’’, 4 April 2012. During the electoral campaigns for the 2011 Duma and the 2012 Presidential elections, the ONF had no legal status, and it was not clear what kind of organisation it would become. It was in June 2013 that the ONF held an official founding congress and gained registration by the Ministry of Justice.
21 For the list of decrees and other instructions, see http://onf.ru/leader/ukazy, accessed 15 January 2017.
22 Pre-election pamphlet of Vladimir Putin, ‘101 vopros Stanislavu Govorukhinu, nachal’niku predvybornogo shtaba kandidata v Prezidenty Rossiiskoi Federatsii Vladimira Putina’, 7 February 2012.
23 The ROI was created to stimulate public initiatives by citizens; every proposal that collected more than 100,000 signatures was to be discussed in the Duma.
24 This initiative is No. 759 on the ROI site, available at: https://www.roi.ru/759/, accessed 15 January 2017. For Naval’nyi’s blog post on his proposal, see Naval’nyi (Citation2013b). However, the government was reluctant to proceed with the draft law (Makutina Citation2013), arguing that the total amount should not be regulated by federal law, but by government order. Naval’nyi’s proposal was not discussed in the State Duma.
25 Zakonoproekt No. 310244-6 ‘O vnesenii izmenenii v nekotorye zakonodatel'nye akty Rossiiskoi Federatsii (v chasti ogranicheniya prav poluchatelei byudzhetnykh sredstv i yuridicheskikh lits s gosudarstvennym uchastiem na zakupku legkovykh avtomobilei vysokoi stoimosti’, available at: http://asozd2.duma.gov.ru/main.nsf/%28SpravkaNew%29?OpenAgent&RN=310244-6&02, accessed 15 January 2017. Despite the ONF’s active campaigns, debate on its draft law soon ended. The draft was not adopted, suggesting that the regime was in no hurry to introduce such limits.
26 Gosudarstvennaya Duma: Stenogramma zasedanii, Tom 23 (238) 2013 god, osennyaya sessiya, 528–29.
27 ‘Planernoe zasedanie Peterburgskogo mezhdunarodnogo ekonomicheskogo foruma’, 21 June 2013, available at: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/18383, accessed 7 August 2017.
28 ‘Proekt ONF po bor’be s korruptsiei v goszakupkakh i zakupkakh goskompanii nachal svoyu rabotu’, 1 September 2013, available at: https://zachestnyezakupki.onf.ru/news?id=1, accessed 7 August 2017.
29 See ‘Narodnyi front predlagaet vvesti “indeks rastochitel’nosti” dlya regionov’, 21 November 2013, available at: http://onf.ru/2013/11/21/narodny-j-front-predlagaet-vvesti-indeks-rastochitel-nosti-dlya-regionov/, accessed 15 January 2017.
30 ‘ONF nachal monitoring ispolneniya porucheniya prezidenta ob optimizatsii regional’nykh piar-byudzhetov’, 11 February 2014, available at: http://zachestnyezakupki.onf.ru/news?id=67, accessed 15 January 2017.
31 ‘Eksperty ONF sostavili reiting korporativnykh podarkov za byudzhetnyi schet’, 17 December 2013, available at: http://onf.ru/2013/12/17/e-ksperty-onf-sostavili-rejting-korporativny-h-novogodnih-podarkov-za-byudzhetny-j-schet/, accessed 29 August 2017.
32 See the project website Za chestnye zakupki, available at: http://zachestnyezakupki.onf.ru/, accessed 15 January 2017.
33 ‘Istoriya uspekha’, Za chestnye zakupki, available at: https://zachestnyezakupki.onf.ru/success, accessed 10 August 2017.
34 ‘Proekt ONF “Za chestnye zakupki”: pervye itogi i perspektivy’, 27 December 2013, available at: http://zachestnyezakupki.onf.ru/news?id=53, accessed 15 January 2017.
35 ‘Konferentsiya Obshcherossiiskogo narodnogo fronta’, 5 December 2013, see http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/19787, accessed 18 August 2017.
36 ‘Gubernator sakhalina otkazalsya ot “Mersedesa” za 8 millionov’, 26 December 2013, available at: http://onf.ru/2013/12/26/gubernator-sahalina-otkazalsya-ot-mersedesa-za-8-millionov/, accessed 15 January 2017.
37 ‘Protiv korruptsii, protiv oppozitsii’, Vzglyad, 10 December 2015, available at: http://www.vz.ru/opinions/2015/12/10/783142.html, accessed 15 January 2017.
38 ‘On vam ne dimon’, YouTube, 2 March 2017, available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrwlk7_GF9g, accessed 30 July 2017. After a defamation lawsuit brought by Alisher Usmanov, one of the main targets of the video, the Lyublinskii district court ordered Naval’nyi to delete the video on 30 May 2017, but Naval’nyi refused.
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Mari Aburamoto
Mari Aburamoto, Assistant Professor, Slavic-Eurasian Research Center, Hokkaido University, Kita 9 Nishi 7, Kita-ku, Sapporo, Hokkaido 060-0809, Japan