BORIS KAGARLITSKY, MOSCOW
A FEAST OF FOOLS
Three opposition parties have contested results of the Russia’s March 11 regional elections pleading numerous violations. The liberal Union of Right Forces (SPS) questions the results of the elections to the Moscow legislature. SPS ran short of 0.2% of voices failing to overcome the 7% threshold. The Communists (KPRF) are discontent with the results of the elections to the Dagestan Parliament having scored barely above the minimum threshold of 7%. The Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) insists that the results were fabricated all in regions. In the Republic of Tuva the results of the reelections in some constituencies were for the second time declared not void, while the republican parliament can’t make a quorum and start working.
Harsh debates about the election results strangely don’t amend total disinterest of the general public. During the last ten years, and especially under the Putin rule, the Russian society has lost any interest in politics, or rather in what they present as politics here in Russia. This tendency has become very evident recently.
So, may I ask, where does the rush among the MPs come from? They barely have any influence on the situation. All more or less significant issues are resolved at the level of the presidential administration, local problems are priority of the regional governors – neither the former nor the latter are elected. And if the recent elections are a dog-and-pony show, so why all this drama?
I admit that any competition, be it a rat race, seems more tremendous from within. Captivated with the emulative spirit of the game the insiders are extremely thrilled no matter what the reward – a million dollars or a bonbon.
All the more that the whole show is generously sponsored. Mind you that the amount of money spent on the elections in Russia have little correlation with their political value. Take Ukraine, here the result of the elections determine the future political landscape but they hardly spend on the elections more than we do. Of course, here, in Russia, we have extra-money. Should we spend it on repairing roads, paying salaries to doctors and teachers or something of that kind? Perish the thought, we'd better spend it on elections, hack journalists and skilled spin-doctors.
Russians are no longer surprised that their government has such priorities. But what is surprising is that the politicians are rattled. We have parliamentary and presidential elections coming soon, the commentators and politicians tell us. And the balance of political forces in the local elections in October 2007 will be partly formed by the recent vote.
So what?
What will change if this or that party wins or loses several mandates? Can it change something in the political life of our country? No, it can not, I assure you. What is at stake is the life of the MPs.
Lawmakers have found their niche in the life of the Kremlin – they are modern equivalents of the court fools. A king can invite the fool to the feast or make him live with all his threadbare jokes for the tavern to celebrate with the hay-shakers. And that makes great difference!
The fools are crowded in the back yard forcing each other out from the door, hoping for a king’s servant or any of his advisers to look out to tell the news.
The rumors about the forthcoming transfer of power don’t make it easier for the jesters. The less useful he is for the court and its intrigues the more he has reason to bite lips. Will they let him come to the king’s feast next time or will leave him outside the court? Or maybe, they will do justice to his wit and will resort to his advice?
From this angle, the bunching in the back yard becomes more like a high drama. All maneuvers will do regardless of the consequences. The ceremonial of the court is left aside.
Does this mean that in our far-from-democratic regime any parliamentary opposition and parliamentary politics is impossible in concept? Half-and-half: on the one hand, no one will be able to do anything for the country with the parliament like ours. It is not the pro-Kremlin “United Russia” to blame but the whole system. The Duma couldn’t work with “liberal” majority in 1990s or later with the “communist” majority.
But still, there is a chance that Duma will serve as a political tribune for the civil society to step up and continue the social struggle. In the beginning of the XX century the Russian left (not the Bolsheviks only) saw the parliament as such a tribune.
But back then the civil society was stronger and the “social struggle” was not only an expression from a history text-book. The fact that today’s Duma can not be regarded otherwise than as a buffoonery should be explained not only by the authoritarian rule and rascally opposition but at large by the weakness of the civil society.
We can keep on mocking at the MPs’ rat race, but this mockery is from time to time interrupted.
For Nikolay Gogol’s famous: "Who are you laughing at? You are laughing at yourselves", stays ever acute.
Boris Kagarlitsky is Director of the Institute of Globalization and Social Movements
23.03.2007
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