Putinism


Putinism is the social, political, and economic system of Russia formed during the political leadership of Vladimir Putin. It is characterized by the concentration of political and financial powers in the hands of "siloviks", current and former "people with shoulder marks", coming from a total of 22 governmental enforcement agencies, the majority of them being the Federal Security Service, Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, Armed Forces of Russia, and National Guard of Russia. According to Arnold Beichman, "Putinism in the 21st century has become as significant a watchword as Stalinism was in the 20th."
The "Chekist takeover" of the Russian state and economic assets has been allegedly accomplished by a clique of Putin's close associates and friends who gradually became a leading group of Russian oligarchs and who "seized control over the financial, media and administrative resources of the Russian state", and restricted democratic freedoms and human rights. According to Julie Anderson, Russia has been transformed to an "FSB state". Mass de-politicization has been described as an important element of Putinism's social course. Mass social involvement being discouraged, politics are reduced to "pure management" left to those who are in power, free from interference by the masses. In foreign affairs, Putinism has been described as nationalist and neo-imperialist.

Terminology

Putinism was first used in the article by Andrey Piontkovsky published on 11 January 2000 in Sovetskaya Rossiya, and placed on the Yabloko website on the same day. He characterized Putinism as "the highest and final stage of bandit capitalism in Russia, the stage where, as one half-forgotten classic said, the bourgeoisie throws the flag of the democratic freedoms and the human rights overboard; and also as a war, 'consolidation' of the nation on the ground of hatred against some ethnic group, attack on freedom of speech and information brainwashing, isolation from the outside world and further economic degradation".

Characteristics

, economists, and political scientists emphasize different features of the system. M. Urnov and V. Kasamara established among political scientists "direct signs of the departure of the current political system of Russia from the basic principles of competition policy".

Characteristics of Putinism highlighted by publicists and journalists

  • Authoritarianism;
  • Personality cult of Putin as a "national hero", through glorification in the media;
  • Strong presidential power, strengthened even in comparison with the era of Boris Yeltsin;
  • Strong state control over property;
  • "sovereign democracy", i.e. a system where Putin works with the "oligarchs created by chaotic, free-market, crony capitalism", who in turn show "absolute fealty";
  • Elements of nepotism ;
  • Reliance on siloviki ;
  • Selective application of justice, arbitrary application of the law ;
  • Relatively liberal but non-transparent financial and tax policies;
  • "manual control" mode, a weak technical government that does not have any political weight, with real control of the country from the presidential administration;
  • Utmost secrecy of power and backstage making of key decisions;
  • "conservative resistance" to the Western "decadence" of irreligion, "same-sex marriage, radical feminism, homosexuality, mass immigration", that is being globalized "under the cover of democracy and human rights";
  • Embrace of the values of orthodox Christianity against liberal cosmopolitanism but also support for other anti-liberal, hard right authoritarians outside of Russia;
  • Using the claim of protecting "our common Fatherland, Great Rus", as a "spiritual cover for... kleptocracy";
  • Authorities' dislike of freedom to express their opinion, censorship;
  • Strategic relations with The Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church, protecting the property interests of the church, and a policy of promoting clericalization of society;File:Sergei Karaganov, Dean, Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs, National Research University Higher School of Economics; Foreign policy adviser to the Presidential Administration, Russia.jpg|thumb|Sergey Karaganov, who is considered close to Putin, formulated many of the core ideas that led to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
  • Eurasianism that posits that Russian civilization does not belong in the "European" or "Asian" categories but instead to the geopolitical concept of Eurasia, therefore making Russia a standalone civilization;
  • All-Russian variant of ultranationalism;
  • In the international arena, Putinism is characterized by nostalgia for Soviet times and a desire to regain the situation before 1989 when the Soviet Union competed on a strong footing with United States in international affairs. Energy is used as an instrument of international politics ;
  • * In response to the Russo-Ukrainian war, Putinism has been characterised by Western politicians as "authoritarianism,... imperialism,... ethno-nationalism."

    Characteristics of Putinism highlighted by political scientists

  • Centralization, Dutch sociologist Marcel Van Herpen . Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan; January 2013. strong presidential power, weakening of the political influence of regional elites and big business;
  • Establishment of direct or indirect state control over the main television channels of the country, censorship;
  • The ever-increasing use of the "administrative resource" in elections at the regional and federal levels;
  • The actual elimination of the system of separation of powers, the establishment of control over the judicial system;
  • Non-public style of political behavior;
  • Monopolization of political power in the hands of the president;
  • Priority of state interests over the interests of the individual, restriction of the rights of citizens, reprisals against civil society;
  • Creating an image of a "besieged fortress", equating opposition activities with hostility, and ousting it from the political field;
  • , the embodiment of state succession in it after a serious injury from the collapse of the Soviet Union;
  • Bureaucratic authoritarianism, the presence of the ruling party merged with the bureaucratic apparatus;
  • State corporativism;
  • Strong state control over property;
  • Aggressive foreign policy ;
  • Focus on order and conservative values;
  • Ideology of national greatness;
  • Anti-Western sentiment.

    Silovik influence

A sociological investigation unveiling the phenomena was done in 2004 by Olga Kryshtanovskaya, who determined the proportion of siloviks in the Russian political elite to be 25%. In Putin's "inner circle" which constitutes about 20 people, the amount of siloviks rises to 58%, and fades to 18–20% in Parliament and 34% in the Government. According to Kryshtanovskaya, there was no capture of power as Kremlin bureaucracy has called siloviks in order to "restore order". The process of siloviks coming into power allegedly started in 1996, Boris Yeltsin's second term. "Not personally Yeltsin, but the whole elite wished to stop the revolutionary process and consolidate power."
When silovik Vladimir Putin was appointed prime minister in 1999, the process was boosted. According to Kryshtanovskaya, "Yes, Putin has brought siloviks with him. But that's not enough to understand the situation. Here's also an objective aspect: the whole political class wished them to come. They were called for service... There was a need of a strong arm, capable from point of view of the elite to establish order in the country."
Kryshtanovskaya has also noted that there were people who had worked in structures "affiliated" with the KGB/FSB. Structures usually considered as such are the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Governmental Communications Commission, Ministry of Foreign Trade, Press Agency News and others. "The itself work in such agencies doesn't involve necessary contacts with special services, but makes you think about it." Summing up numbers of official and "affiliated" siloviks she got an estimate of 77% of such in the power.
Putin's chief national security adviser, Nikolai Patrushev, who believed that the West has been in an undeclared war with Russia for years, was a leading figure behind Russia's updated national security strategy, published in May 2021. It stated that Russia may use "forceful methods" to "thwart or avert unfriendly actions that threaten the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Russian Federation".

2020 amendments to the Russian Constitution

Following a referendum, with Putin's signing an executive order on 3 July 2020 to officially insert the amendments into the Russian Constitution, they took effect on 4 July 2020. Vladimir Pastukhov, a Russian political scientist, advocate and honorary senior research associate of the University College London's School of Slavonic and East European Studies, and Alexander Podrabinek, a Soviet dissident, journalist and Russian human rights defender, state that Russia has been taking on the characteristics of a totalitarianism as a result of the constitutional amendments. This is reflected in incremental but steady and aggressive process of the seizing of full control over public and private life, and de facto criminalization of any opposition and dissidence.

Classification

Intelligence state

According to former Securitate general Ion Mihai Pacepa, "In the Soviet Union, the KGB was a state within a state. Now former KGB officers are running the state. They have custody of the country's 6,000 nuclear weapons, entrusted to the KGB in the 1950s, and they now also manage the strategic oil industry renationalized by Putin. The KGB successor, rechristened FSB, still has the right to electronically monitor the population, control political groups, search homes and businesses, infiltrate the federal government, create its own front enterprises, investigate cases, and run its own prison system. The Soviet Union had one KGB officer for every 428 citizens. Putin's Russia has one FSB-ist for every 297 citizens."
"Under Russian Federation President and former career foreign intelligence officer Vladimir Putin, an "FSB State" composed of chekists has been established and is consolidating its hold on the country. Its closest partners are organized criminals. In a world marked by a globalized economy and information infrastructure, and with transnational terrorism groups utilizing all available means to achieve their goals and further their interests, Russian intelligence collaboration with these elements is potentially disastrous", said politologist Julie Anderson.
Former KGB officer Konstantin Preobrazhenskiy shares similar ideas. When asked "How many people in Russia work in FSB?", he replied: "Whole country. FSB owns everything, including Russian Army and even own Church, the Russian Orthodox Church... Putin managed to create new social system in Russia".
"Vladimir Putin's Russia is a new phenomenon in Europe: a state defined and dominated by former and active-duty security and intelligence officers. Not even fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, or the Soviet Union – all undoubtedly much worse creations than Russia – were as top-heavy with intelligence talent", said intelligence expert Reuel Marc Gerecht.