The Putin system Yavlinsky, Grigory
2019, 20190219, 2019-02-19
eBook
A quarter century after the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia once again looms large over world affairs, from Ukraine to Syria to the 2016 U.S. election. Yet how power works in present-day Russia-how ...Vladimir Putin came to power and maintains his rule-remains opaque and often misunderstood. InThe Putin System, Russian economist and opposition leader Grigory Yavlinsky explains his country's politics from a unique perspective, voicing a Russian liberal critique of the post-Soviet system that is vital for the West to hear. Combining the firsthand experience of a practicing politician with academic expertise, Yavlinsky gives unparalleled insights into the sources of Putin's power and what might be next. He argues that Russia's dysfunction is neither the outcome of one man's iron-fisted rule nor a deviation from the supposedly natural development of Western-style political institutions. Instead, Russia's peripheral position in the global economy has fundamentally shaped the regime's domestic and foreign policy, nourishing authoritarianism while undermining its opponents. The quasi-market reforms of the 1990s, the bureaucracy's self-perpetuating grip on power, and the Russian elite's frustration with its secondary status have all combined to enable personalized authoritarian rule and corruption. Ultimately, Putin is as much a product of the system as its creator. In a time of sensationalism and fear,The Putin Systemis essential reading for anyone seeking to understand how power is wielded in Russia.
AFTERWORD Yavlinsky, Grigory
The Putin System,
02/2019
Book Chapter
A bout four years have passed since the first edition of this book was written and first published in Russian. Looking back, I can see that its main ideas are still valid and actual, despite changes ...in Russian life and the political system. Some of the judgments I made back then may look too cautious in light of the realities of 2018; some, on the contrary, may seem premature. But on the whole the situation seems to be progressing (or maybe “regressing” would be a better word) roughly along the lines described in this book. The Russian political system is
RUSSIA TODAY Yavlinsky, Grigory
The Putin System,
02/2019
Book Chapter
My take on the political system of present-day Russia is that it is an authoritarian country of a peripheral, or marginal, type. Let me clarify: for me, this characterization is not a means to ...denounce the country or to slap Russia’s government with a negative, op-ed-style label. I see it as first and foremost an accurate and unbiased assessment of the realities of today’s Russia. Such an assessment is not intended to give rise to emotions and value judgments. Each of us lives within a certain frame of reference, a sociopolitical environment that we need to comprehend in order to
All the actual and potential dangers emanating from Russia’s current political regime amount to a tragic grotesque, from the standpoint of historical development. The political system of present-day ...Russia is the expression and embodiment of the mind-set of the group of people that have been ruling it for more than twenty years. This mind-set is virtually devoid of any serious ideological frameworks of analysis, has no bedrock values beyond individual wants, and worships personal consumption and enrichment. The ruling group tries to give an ideological twist to its policies, of a kind that appeals to the most basic clannish, tribal
At the turn of the millennium, in the wake of a rapid and, in many ways, catastrophic collapse of the Soviet political and economic system, a peculiar social and economic formation became reality in ...the “new” Russia. What I am talking about are not any particular events or even trends that have been present in Russian political and economic life over the past two decades but rather the overall framework of entrenched economic and social relationships that now exist there. Having emerged gradually over this period of time, this problematic framework is now entrenched and normalized in Russia. This framework
The events of the twenty years following the collapse of the Soviet system have brought Russia to a political system that is based upon a monopolistic grip on power by one dominant group of the ...ruling bureaucracy. This group appoints whomever they want as chief executives of every uniformed agency (the military, police, security services, and so forth), every administrative unit, and every major economic institution.
This system precludes the replacement of the ruling circle without the simultaneous breakup of the entire system and a deep political crisis. This is a system geared toward its own selfperpetuation. It excludes the
This book directly confronts uncomfortable questions that many prefer to brush aside: if economists and other scholars, politicians, and business professionals understand the causes of economic ...crises, as they claim, then why do such damaging crises continue to occur? Can we trust business and intellectual elites who advocate the principles of Realpolitik and claim the "public good" as their priority, yet consistently favor maximization of profit over ethical issues?
Former deputy prime minister of Russia Grigory Yavlinsky, an internationally respected free-market economist, makes a powerful case that the often-cited causes of global economic instability-institutional failings, wrong decisions by regulators, insufficient or incorrect information, and the like-are only secondary to a far more significant underlying cause: the failure to understand that universal social norms are essential to thriving businesses and social and economic progress. Yavlinsky explores the widespread disregard for moral values in business decisions and calls for restoration of principled behavior in politics and economic practices. The unwelcome alternative, he warns, will be a twenty-first-century global economy in the grip of unending crises.
Arias-King interviews Grigory A. Yavlinsky, cofounder and chairman of Yabloko, a liberal party in Russia. Yavlinsky talks about Vladimir Putin's anti-liberal imperial ideology.
