In Russia a Democracy and Does it Matter?

Abstract

cratic and free market a country than not and that since 2000, despite troubling restrictions on the media and political parties, Russia has become democratic.1 These views, it must be said, are singularly opposed to that of most experts, many of whom discern instead what Gordon Hahn calls stealth authoritarianism or some thing resembling it.2 That said, are Powell's and other similar claims true, and does it really mat ter to U.S. policy one way or another? The fact that we must revisit these questions again illus trates the lamentable but deeply rooted tendency of U.S. experts and administrations to evaluate Russia either on the basis of personal relations among leaders or on the basis of superficialities rather than deeper observation, particularly one informed by Russian history. Such superficialities-for example, the trans position of statistical similarities between Mex ico, Turkey, and Russia and the assertion of structural congruence among them on this dubi ous basis-reflect a longstanding and often self serving fallacy in foreign studies of Russia. This fallacy assumes that what looks like Western forms and relationships (for example, economic statistics) indicates that Russia has finally become more like us. Supposedly, five good years of economic growth mean that Russia is becoming a capitalistic and genuine mar ket economy. Actually, one constant factor of Russian history has been Russian rulers' quite successful adaptation of Western democratic institutions and practices for purposes that are fundamentally illiberal and antidemocratic. As the Russian dissident Boris Kagarlitsky observes, because of the differences between Russia and Western states and societies, West ern institutions, transposed into Russia, become mere facades for an enduring political system nearly akin to what classical writers termed oriental despotism.3 Consequently, the social roots that nourish Western practices, discourse, and institutions cannot be sustained in Russia and become something quite unrec ognizable.