Putin V. The People by Samuel A. Greene;Graeme B. Robertson;

Author:Samuel A. Greene;Graeme B. Robertson;
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780300238396
Publisher: Yale University Press

A NORMAL DAY

When it comes to politics, Andrei is both vociferous and vociferously uninterested. Looking ahead to the 2018 presidential elections, he told us he planned to go to work.

“It’s just a normal day,” he said.

The only time he did vote, he told us, was when he was in the army. “It was against my will,” he said.

If forced to vote, however, he would support Putin, mostly because he despises the opposition.

“The leaders we have, they’re bad, but at least they’re already in power, and life is kind of okay,” he said. “At least on the surface. But these guys [in the opposition], they’re clowns. . . . I don’t even consider them to be an opposition. It’s just a band of crooks, who are really being fed from somewhere overseas. It’s not even really a secret anymore, it’s that, what’s his name, the one they sent to prison, who’s now in Latvia or somewhere. I forgot his name.” (A few minutes later, Andrei remembered: Khodorkovsky.)

Clearly, one does not need to be agreeable to support Putin (even if only for the lack of a better alternative), and neither is disagreeableness a direct route to the opposition. But to the extent that agreeableness has helped support Putin’s political fortunes, it holds a trap.

If Russia’s most agreeable people are among Putin’s biggest supporters—and if the reason they support him is not because of anything he’s done for them materially or even ideologically, but because that’s what the social context demands—what happens when the social context begins to shift? Ironically, despite the importance of loyalty in structuring Russian politics, an “agreeable” electorate is not, in fact, an inherently loyal electorate. Or, rather, its loyalty is to fitting in—to what Havel called “living in harmony with society”—rather than to Putin himself.

“I just don’t see any real opponent to our president,” the highly “agreeable” Anna told us ahead of the 2018 presidential election. Strikingly, her support for Putin was devoid of any of the aggression and anger that characterized Andrei. “Because there’s no worthy competitor. If there was a worthy competitor, maybe our political situation would change, we might have a different leader. But these [people on the ballot] aren’t competitors. They’re too little. . . . That’s just my point of view. I don’t see a worthy opposition to Putin. When I do, then I’ll say, ‘That’s my president.’ Of course we need young blood. We need to change.”

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.