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ABSTRACT
The article attempts to analyze the mechanisms of political control used by the Kremlin vis-à-vis its rivals. Russian authorities had opted the politics of fear, which include overt intimidation and public discrediting of the regime's critics, and selective persecution and open harassment of opposition activists and/or supporters. This approach to political control to some degree reproduced similar mechanisms that had enabled regime survival in the late-Soviet period, and fit general trends of repressive policies in a number of contemporary authoritarian regimes. The article discusses causes and mechanisms of the politics of fear in contemporary Russia, its roots in comparative and historical contexts, and strengths and weaknesses of repressive policy in Russia from the viewpoints of the regime, the opposition, and Russian society.
Notes
English translation © 2015 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC, from the Russian text © 2015 “Kontrapunkt.” “Politika strakha: kak rossiiskii rezhim protivostoit svoim protivnikam,” Kontrapunkt, 2015, no. 1, pp. 1–11. Translated by Brad Damaré.
Vladimir Iakovlevich Gel'man ([email protected]) is a candidate of political sciences and professor at the European University in St. Petersburg, and Finland Distinguished Professor at the Aleksanteri Institute, University of Helsinki.
Translation reprinted from Russian Politics and Law, vol. 53, nos. 5-6. DOI: 10.1080/10611940.2015.1146058.
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9. Guriev and Treisman, “The New Authoritarianism.”
10. Experts also note the role of other structural factors in the repressive policies of authoritarian regimes, particularly their relatively high level of socioeconomic inequality. See Svolik, The Politics of Authoritarian Rule.
11. C. Davenport, “Multi-Dimensional Threat Perception and State Repressions: An Inquiry into Why States Apply Negative Sanctions,” American Journal of Political Science, 1993, vol. 38, no. 3, pp. 683–713.
12. See S. Guriev and O. Tsyvinskii, “Ot repressii k repressiiam,” Vedomosti, July 31, 2012 (www.vedomosti.ru/opinion/articles/2012/07/31/ot_repressij_k_repressiyam, accessed May 30, 2015).
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16. V. Gel'man, Authoritarian Russia: Analyzing Post-Soviet Regime Changes (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2015), ch. 5, 6.
17. See, in particular, V. Gel'man, O. Marganiya, and D. Travin, Reexamining Economic and Political Reforms in Russia, 1985–2000: Generations, Ideas, and Changes (Lanham. MD: Lexington Books, 2014), ch. 6.
18. For a typology of reactions to crisis, see A.O. Hirschman, Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Response to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970).
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20. On the Soviet leadership's dilemmas in relation to the risks of protest and the limits of buying loyalty, see Y. Gaidar, Collapse of an Empire: Lessons for Modern Russia (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2007), ch. 4, esp. pp. 90–91.
21. V. Silitski, “Contagion Deterred: Preemptive Authoritarianism in the Former Soviet Union (the Case of Belarus),” Stanford University, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. CDDRL Working Papers, 2006, no. 66 (http://cddrl.fsi.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/Silitski_No_66.pdf, accessed June 21, 2015).
22. See, in particular, A. Paddington, Broadcasting Freedom: The Cold War Triumph of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2003); I. Utekhin, “Vremia nesvobody,” Neprikosnovennyi zapas, 2004, no. 2 (http://magazines.russ.ru/nz/2004/35/ut15.html, accessed June 21, 2015).
23. For a detailed review, see L. Alekseeva, Istoriia inakomysliia v SSSR: noveishii period (Moscow: Moskovskaia Khel'sinkskaia gruppa, 2012) (www.mhg.ru/files/012/Histinak.pdf, accessed June 21, 2015).
24. V. Gel'man and D. Travin, “‘Zagoguliny’ rossiiskoi modernizatsii: smena pokolenii i traektorii reform,” Neprikosnovennyi zapas, 2013, no. 4 (www.nlobooks.ru/node/3841, accessed June 21, 2015).
25. Silitski, “Contagion Deterred”; A. Wilson, Belarus: The Last Dictatorship in Europe (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2011).
26. Levitsky and Way, Competitive Authoritarianism, pp. 201–7.
27. R. Potocki, “Belarus: A Tale of Two Elections,” Journal of Democracy, 2011, vol. 23, no. 3, pp. 49–63.
28. For examples of parallels, see D. Travin, “Belaia lenta + Rus' = Belarus',” Fontanka.ru, March 6, 2012 (www.fontanka.ru/2012/03/06/073/, accessed June 21, 2015).
29. See “Doklad Komissii ‘Kruglogo stola 12 dekabria’ po Obshchestvennomu rassledovaniiu sobytii 6 maia 2012 goda na Bolotnoi ploshchadi,” April 22, 2012 (http://rt12dec.ru/bolotnoe-delo/doklad-komissii-kruglogo-stola-12-dekabrya-po-obshhestvennomu-rassledovaniyu-sobytij-6-maya-2012-goda-na-bolotnoj-ploshhadi-22-04-2013/ accessed June 21, 2015).
30. In particular, see the overview in B. Taylor, “Putin's Crackdown: Sources, Instruments, and Challenges,” PONARS Policy Memos, 2013, no. 277 (http://www.ponarseurasia.org/sites/default/files/policy-memos-pdf/Pepm_277_Taylor_Sept2013.pdf, accessed June 21, 2015).
31. For more, see F. Dauce, “The Duality of Coercion in Russia: Cracking Down on ‘Foreign Agents,’” Demokratizatsiya: The Journal of Post-Soviet Democratization, 2015, vol. 23, no. 1, pp. 55–75; G. Flikke, “Resurgent Authoritarianism: The Case of Russia's New NGO Legislation,” Post-Soviet Affairs, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 103–31 (www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1060586X.2015.1034981, accessed June 21, 2015).
32. M. Kramer, “The Clampdown of Internet Activities in Russia and the Implications for Western Policy,” PONARS Policy Memos, 2014, no. 350 (www.ponarseurasia.org/sites/default/files/policy-memos-pdf/Pepm350_Kramer_Sept2014.pdf accessed June 21, 2015); see also Andrei Soldatov's article in the present issue.
33. R. Smyth and I. Soboleva, “Looking Beyond the Economy: Pussy Riot and the Kremlin's Voting Coalition,” Post-Soviet Affairs, 2014, vol. 30, no. 4, pp. 257–75; N. Robinson, The Political Origins of Russia's “Culture Wars” (Limerick: University of Limerick, Department of Politics and Public Administration, 2014). (https://www.academia.edu/6902059/The_Political_Origins_of_Russias_Culture_Wars).
34. E. Masiuk, “Mikhail Savva: ‘Mne ugrozhali: 15 let po stat'e UK “gosudarstvennaia izmena”…’” Novaia gazeta, March 18, 2015 (www.novayagazeta.ru/politics/67632.html, accessed July 5, 2015).
35. N. Golitsyna, “Sergei Guriev: ‘Parizh luchshe tiur'my v Moskve,’” Radio Svoboda, February 3, 2014 (www.svoboda.org/content/article/25249729.html, accessed June 21, 2015).
36. “V Rossii rastet kolichstvo politzaklichennykh: tsentr ‘Memorial,’” Krym. Realii, June 4, 2015 (http://ru.krymr.com/content/news/27053923.html, accessed June 21, 2015).
37. V. Gel'man, “Political Opposition in Russia: A Troubled Transformation,” Europe-Asia Studies, 2015, vol. 67, no. 2, pp. 177–91.
38. S. Greene and G. Robertson, “Explaining Putin's Popularity: Rallying around the Russian Flag,” Washington Post, Monkey Cage, September 9, 2014 (www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage/wp/2014/09/09/explaining-putins-popularity-rallying-round-the-russian-flag/, accessed June 21, 2015).
39. For the official text, see “Federal'nyi zakon ot 23.05.2015 N129-F3 ‘O vnesenii izmenenii v otdel'nye zakonodatel'nye akty Rossiiskoi Federatsii’” (http://publication.pravo.gov.ru/Document/View/0001201505230001?index = 2&rangeSize = 1, accessed July 5, 2015).
40. For the official text, see “Ukaz Prezidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii ot 28.05.2015 N273 ‘O vnesenii izmenenii v perechen’ svedenii, otnesennykh k gosudarstvennoi taine, utverzhdennyi Ukazom Prezidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii ot 30 noiabria 1995 g. No. 1203'” (http://publication.pravo.gov.ru/Document/View/0001201505280001?index = 0&rangeSize = 1, accessed July 5, 2015).
41. Guriev and Treisman, The New Authoritarianism.
42. G. Egorov and K. Sonin, “Diktatory i viziri: ekonomicheskaia teoriia loial'nosti i kompetentnosti,” Obshchestvennye nauki i sovremennost', 2008, no. 2, pp. 36–51 (http://ecsocman.hse.ru/data/2010/11/12/1214795173/Egorov.pdf, accessed July 5, 2015).
43. Svolik, The Politics of Authoritarian Rule; Schedler, The Politics of Uncertainty; on the effects of threat perception during the fall of communist regimes, see T. Kuran, “Now Out of Never: The Element of Surprise in the East European Revolutions of 1989,” World Politics, 1991, vol. 44, no. 1, pp. 7–48.
44. Davenport, “Multi-Dimensional Threat Perception.”