Presidential Power in Russia by Eugene Huskey

Author:Eugene Huskey [Huskey, Eugene]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Public Policy, Political Science, General
ISBN: 9781315482194
Google: UL8YDQAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 32206944
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 1999-09-01T00:00:00+00:00

Conclusion

Since the groundbreaking work of Robert Dahl in the late 1950s, students of democratic politics have recognized that political relations within the state and between state and society assume different forms depending on the policy in dispute. This insight is no less applicable to Russia in transition. As one moves from higher-profile and higher-stakes issues such as national security and budgetary politics to the reform of the legal system, one finds a different set of actors, a different level of presidential engagement, and different decision making forums. Where new laws on the courts emerge after months of detailed discussion dominated by legal scholars and lesser officials in the presidency and Government, new policies on military reform and budgetary sequestration often follow intensive negotiations that involve the leading figures of state. Similarly, if neither the introduction of the jury trial nor military reform excites much public passion, revisions to the tax laws can create a national outcry. In August 1996, for example, intense public reaction led President Yeltsin to abandon an ill-conceived tax decree that would have imposed a surcharge on all bank transactions.159

But for all the distinctive features of politics in each policy field, there are patterns of behavior that recur across a broad range of issues. One such regularity in Russia is the role of the presidency as champion of reform. In all three case studies, a coterie of individuals within—or allied to—the presidency advanced reforms that challenged powerful interest networks in the Government, the Duma, and the regions. These conservative cartels sought, with varying degrees of success, to retain the status quo or, at a minimum, to dilute the proposed reforms. Thus, Lebed settled the Chechen war in the face of resistance from the armed forces and the nationalists. Baturin and Chubais launched a reform of the military against the wishes of the leadership of the power ministries. Livshits and Chubais pursued a campaign to introduce budgetary discipline against the opposition of regional and business interests and their allies in the Government and Duma. And Pashin helped to push through a reform of the courts over the objections of the law enforcement community.

In all political systems, of course, well-placed and ambitious men and women make things happen. But what is remarkable about contemporary Russian politics is the extent to which these individuals—acting as agents of the president—have imposed reform from above without first building a broad base of support in the bureaucracy and society. In this sense, the current transition from Communist rule mirrors earlier reform episodes in Russian history, which ultimately failed because the conservative cartels—unable to forestall the introduction of new laws and decrees—found ways to scuttle the implementation of state policy.160 Such is the danger of reformism without democracy. As Guillermo O’Donnell observed:

[I]nstitutionalized democracies are slow at making decisions. But once those decisions are made, they are relatively more likely to be implemented. In delegative democracies, in contrast, we witness a decision-making frenzy, what in Latin America we call decretismo. Because such hasty, unilateral executive

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