Lessons from Russia: Clinton and US Democracy Promotion by Lee Marsden (review)

Abstract

REVIEWS 185 Marsden, Lee. Lessonsfrom Russia: Clinton and US DemocracyPromotion. Ashgate, Aldershot and Burlington, VT, 2005. xii + 218 pp. Tables. Notes. Bibliography. Index. ?50.00. Lee Marsden here offers an original, meticulously researched account of the policies of theUS Administration of President Bill Clinton towards Russia. Readers of SEER will appreciate that this is a studyprimarily ofUS foreign policy, rather than one of Russian democratization. Russian specialists will, however, find very useful and enlightening discussions of the complex Russian-American interactions of the 1990s. The close and well known relationship between Vice President Al Gore and Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin was just one aspect of the connective web that bound together officials from both countries. Marsden also demonstrates the way in which agencies such as theUS Agency for International Development and the (US) National Endowment forDemocracy became sponsors of interna tional and Russian non-governmental organizations, committed to practical democratization and to the liberalization ofRussian civil society. At the implementation/NGO level, US-sponsored democratization, fun nelled through some twenty-threeor so departments and agencies, had some impact, although Marsden ? quite understandably ? finds it difficult to assess, for example, the results achieved by US-backed local human rights groups inNizhnii Tagil. His main interest is, in fact, at the general, 'macro' level of policy development. He sees Clinton's role as central, not least in steering the democracy-promotion policy through the choppy waters of the second term: not only in connection with the conflicts inChechnya and the rise of theRussian oligarchs, but also in the difficultpolitical circumstances following theRepublican victories in the 1994US midterm elections. (Among other things, the book is a testament to Clinton's political skill and ability to overcome domestic enemies.) Marsden analyses persuasively Clinton's commitment to the brittle reformism of Boris El'tsin: the policy known in Washington at the time as 'Yeltsin drunk orYeltsin sober'.Marsden concludes that 'Clinton's backing forYeltsin was calculated to grant specific national security benefits to the United States' (p. 83), notably in regard to nuclear weapons proliferation and to Russian cooperation (via the Partnership for Peace) with an expanded NATO. Clinton, the president of economic globalization, also clearly conceptualized 'democracy' to an important extent as a function of free markets. Clinton declined to develop any significant relationship with theRussian legislature and 'took the view thatYeltsin must be supported by undemocratic means if necessary' (p. 129). In general terms, we are here offered a picture of US democracy-promotion in Russia which emphasizes the primacy of strategic American interest over any overarching commitment to democratization per se. As Marsden puts it in his conclusion: 'a democratic government representing the electorate would not have pursued economic reforms that inflicted somuch damage for so littlebenefit on itsown people' (p. 197). Some readers may findMarsden's conclusions naive. Was Washington in the 1990s ever likely to uncouple 'markets' and 'political democracy'? Clinton was elected in 1992 to promote domestic prosperity and to safeguard US i86 SEER, 86, I, 2008 security, not least in respect of the former Soviet 'loose nukes'; in both respects, he did pretty well. Russian specialists may also have particular quarrels about the account given here of thepossibilities for real democratiza tion in this era. Itmay also be feltby some that the book's theoretical and conceptual framework ? rooted in competing versions of decision-making theory ? is a little too intrusive, and too redolent of this study's origins as a doctoral thesis. It is also not entirely clear why, ifdecision-making theory is to be taken so seriously, the author steers so far clear of International Relations theory.After all, at one level, thisbook represents an exemplifica tion of tenets of traditional realism.Marsden also does not really engage with the huge literature, reaching back toThomas Jefferson, on ideals and interests inAmerican foreign policy. My own view is that this is an outstandingly good piece of research. Inter nal Clinton Administration documents are not yet available for academic investigation. The Clinton Presidential Library in Litde Rock, Arkansas, is unlikely to offermuch in the foreseeable future to researchers intoClinton's foreign policy. Lee Marsden demonstrates what can be achieved by conscien tious reading of published public records...