Watching Russia
Yesterday’s one-man protest in Moscow against the detention of an opposition leader Garry Kasparov illustrates how absurd Russian politics can be.
In the English-language media, I couldn’t find a lot of detail of the one-man picket staged outside the jail where Kasparov was held.
So here’s the gist: leaders of the opposition took turns staging one-man picket. The one-man picket didn’t require the permission from the authorities. To arrest the lone protester, the police allegedly sent out two young men to stand near the protester with similar signs, creating an illegal organized demonstration.
The lone protester, Ilya Yashin, who is the leader of the liberal youth organization, was detained and later released.
What is the most puzzling, however, is the innate paranoia of the ruling elite and President Putin. He resorts to scare tactics to impact results of Sunday’s parliamentary elections, in which his party’s victory is a foregone conclusion.
The sign reads: Putin’s plan is working. Photo from Ezhednevniy Zhurnal.
Some commentators have suggested that Putin inherently fears the uncertainty of the election, which goes back to his St. Petersburg days.
Typically, dictators fear the people’s choice.
Watching the whole pre-electoral theater in the managed democracy, one cannot help but compare the Russia proper with the Baltic Russians under the so-called oppressive regimes of Latvia and Estonia.
When Russians fled the church reforms of the 17th century across the border, they’d settled in what is now eastern Latvia. They were mostly illiterate Old Believers who moved here and composed tight communities.
Okay, they’ve not sought liberty, equality, and fraternity.
But they just wanted to practice their religion as they wanted. Throughout centuries, they managed to preserve their culture and the Russian language. They survived minority policies in the inter-war Latvia, policies of the Soviet occupations, espousing atheism.
Today more of the Russian younger post-Soviet generation turn toward common European values – the rule of law and democracy – rather than the historically typical Russian values of “managed democracy” and a strong hand. These Russian values, for example, don’t allow the political elite to “cry and cry some more for Konstantin Pats, Lydia Koidula, and everyone in between,” as Justin put it.
This is one reason why Baltic Russians aren’t in a hurry to move back. It is evident in the failure of the Russian government’s program to resettle Russians from the “oppressive” Baltic “regimes.”
Since 2006 when the resettlement program was launched less than a dozen Russians from the Baltics have moved back to Russia. A total of 130 people decided to repatriate to Russia. And those who did move back complained about low-paid jobs outside their education and experience.
Journalists in Russian-language newspapers in the Baltics, for example, are glad that the Baltic countries don’t take the Russian approach to dealing with anti-government rhetoric and unfavorable coverage.
Pro-Russian groups in the Baltics use the laws of freedom of assembly and speech to protest against policies of the government.
Both would have been very difficult in Putin’s Russia. With just a couple of days before the election, the ruling elite there appears nervous, in spite of the utmost popularity of Putin.
On Sunday, millions of Russian citizens, including some that live in Latvia and Estonia, will go to polling stations. They will cast their vote in a parliamentary election that some have dubbed as a referendum on Putin’s Russia.
On Monday, life will return back to mundane and normal. At least, as normal as Russia can get.
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