Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Final Paper
Final Paper
com He 1
Kaiwei He (david.hezy@gmail.com)
Final---Russia
Lying on the Eurasian continent, Russia has a vast territory and a kind of
civilization deeply influenced by both the East and the West. In Russia, the state
Russian’s path of development never stopped. After failed Soviet eastern way and
Boris Yeltsin’s western way, Russia now is exploring its own road, led by Vladimir
Putin.
Since he took over from Yeltsin in 1999, Putin hasve won two elections and have
successfully been through two terms. Because the constitution limits that a president
could not serve for more than two terms, Putin transferred to serve as premier after his
second term as the president. And Dmitri Medvedev became the president of Russia.
Even so, Putin actually acted as the president during his four years as prime minister.
david.hezy@gmail.com He 2
And he used the hand of Medvedev to prolong the tenure of presidents from four
years to six years (Pan 2008). In 2012, Putin was elected as the president of Russia
again. And now, Putin is considering to campaign for his fourth term of office in 2018.
Ten years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia’s economy and politics
fell into disorder. The reason why the Putin regime could rise upon such a weak
foundation was the quick recovery of Russia’s economy, which benefited from the
high demand for resources due to strong global economy and the soaring international
energy prices. Meanwhile, Putin also has a broad mass base. The Russian people have
pretty strong national pride and tend to see the positioning of the country from the
view of maintain the national dignity and national interests. The concept of a powerful
country is deeply ingrained in Russian people’s heart. Among the successive rulers of
Russia, those who could lead to a national prosperity usually had high reputations,
and the presidents who had high reputations were able to centralize power to
In the article of “Popular Autocrats”, the author Martin K. Dimitrov points out
his view, the incumbents normally use three strategies to ensure high levels of
successfully use the strategies and build a resilient regime that enjoy mass support
david.hezy@gmail.com He 3
Moreover, the elections play an important role in maintaining the stability of the
Putin regime. Based on the general requirements of democratic election, the basic
voters and candidates, and the election process, etc. have been established and
perfected through the constitution and the law of the presidential election. For
example, the law of the presidential election stipulates a series of basic principles of
equality of the right to vote, the principle of direct election, the principle of
multi-candidate election and the principle of secret ballot etc. These principles are
established and abode by as basic elements of democratic elections (Bai 2005; 25).
Therefore, the system of Russia's presidential election tends to be democratic, and its
democracy mechanism. Such an electoral system provides the Putin regime with
legitimacy. This is a little unclear. Putin is genuinely popular, but the electoral
playing field is heavily tilted against the opposition because of Putin’s control of the
press and his exploitation of the economic resources of the state. This is why most
democracy.
For more than a decade, phenomena such as money politics and vote buying
have occurred from time to time in Russia’s elections, but they are not the main
david.hezy@gmail.com He 4
"check and balance" — the legislative, administrative and judicial branches are
respectively independent and contained by each other, in fact, the President has great
and extensive powers above the parliament, the government and the court. In the
presidential campaign, these powers can often affect the public opinion to a great
extent and become the key of winning the election. It is not hard to see that every
president, including both Yeltsin and Putin, carried out campaign strategies positively
and actively with the help of the power of the state in order to win the election.
Specifically, using the power of the state can provide some conveniences for the
personnel, so the ruling candidate can use this power to appoint or remove
Secondly, the President has the right to adjust the national policies to increase
political capital to run for an election. During the election campaign, the ruling
wages and pensions to ease social contradictions and stabilize the voters. President
Putin won the favors and supports of voters through tough policies on Chechnya and
supervision, thus the ruling candidate is able to take advantage of the government’s
resource superiorities to help his campaign. President Putin once carried out national
Fourthly, the ruling candidate could benefit from modifying laws correlated with
presidential elections. Since the first presidential election in 1999, a new law of
presidential elections which made the ruling candidate a beneficiary was enacted
before the elections in Russia (Xu 2008). This is more like it. But it somewhat
democracy is manipulated by him. But as to Russians who have been through the
collapse of the Soviet union and the Yeltsin era, this kind of circumstance is not
surprising. Since Gorbachev's reforms, the abuse of democracy has caused disorder
and disintegration of the state. Then Russian people came to realize that Russia's
authority and its international status. Obviously, Russian people recognized Putin's
managed democracy. They volunteered to go to the polls to vote for Putin, to express
their faith in him. On the issue of democracy, Putin did not yield to the pressure of the
put forward the concept of sovereign democracy, to show to the world that Russia
would decide autonomously how to develop and that it doesn’t need advice (Zuo F
2008).
david.hezy@gmail.com He 6
democratization. They think that Russia will return back to the traditional political
system under the Putin regime and even become Stalinist. In addition, the
policies embody the authoritarian and that the political form of current Russia is
between the democratic political system and the authoritarian political system. Former
Soviet bloc countries which have used totalitarian political systems for a long time
normally adopt the competitive authoritarian regime during their transitional phases in
the beginning stages of political modernization (Levitsky, Way 2002; 53). The
transition length varies from country to country, determined by the specific nationality,
culture, historical tradition and social and economic factors of each country.
tradition. There was no democracy in tsarist times or in the soviet union period. The
process of political democracy only started since 1991, when the Soviet union
people entrust the development of the state and the revival of the nation to a good
leader. This kind of consciousness has its ideological and cultural foundation. With
david.hezy@gmail.com He 7
the deepening of system transformation, the competitive authoritarian regime may not
become Russia's long-term political form, and the current centralization may not
Stalin's era. However, the process from the competitive authoritarian to the democracy
will be very long and difficult and the result can't be guaranteed.
President Putin monopolizes all powers, muzzles the media, cracks down
Externally, he uses Russia chauvinism to push hegemony; for example, he waged the
capable of doing all those things because the swift rise of the price of oil has sustained
the development of Russian economy. The oil and natural gas account for two-thirds
2014). The rise and fall of international crude oil prices directly affect the prosperity
President Putin attaches great importance the role of the state in the development
of market economy. He did not put the focus of economic transition on the ownership
reform, but emphasized on the control of the important resources. In the Yeltsin period,
most of the oil resources were in the hands of private consortia. Putin established
policies to crack down the oligarchs shortly after taking office in 2000, in order to
stabilize the economy. At the same time, the Iraq war started. The international crude
oil prices thereupon rose sharply, and the oil exports substantially drove the economic
growth because the most crude oil export profits were turned over to the state. Since
david.hezy@gmail.com He 8
2003, Russia started the asset restructuring in the field of energy and increased the
companies, the Russian government monopolizes in the oil exports and controls the
pipelines. Thus the state controls a third of Russia's oil and 90% of the gas (Zuo F
2008). State-owned enterprises have regained the dominance of the energy sector.
President Putin uses the rises of the international oil and gas prices to improve the
financial situation of Russia and the living standard of the residents. By controlling
the energy and building influenced large energy enterprises, energy enterprises have
become a kind of diplomatic weapon and improved the international status of Russia.
Russia has become one of the fast economic growth countries in the world, known as
one of the "BRIC" countries. In 2007, Russia was back into the world's top ten
economies. But prices are now very low. How will that affect Putin’s power?
However, the point is that Russia's economic development is due to rising energy
prices rather than President Putin. Russia's political system under the Putin regime has
no obvious change on the surface, but actually its democratic connotation has greatly
reduced. Putin resorted to a series of measures which were deviated from democracy
in controlling the media and local authorities and clamping down on human rights
groups. The autocracy has given rise to more corruption, reducing the protection of
ownership and the social public security. It is fundamentally limiting the development
prosperity and abundance of life brought by the oil wealth give Putin Russian people's
trust and support. Putin's authoritarian luckily catches up with the economic growth.
There is little evidence that Putin’s dictatorship in recent years has promoted more
effective governance and economic development. On the contrary, the oil wealth and
economic monopoly have made Putin’s regime more deviated from democracy. The
fact that most of the oil wealth are in the hands of a dictator will only make return to
Russia is highly sensitive to energy prices, because oil and gas tax hold up half of
the national budget income. High dependence on energy exports makes Russia fail to
environment, which affects the national economic development and people's living
standard and eventually leads to shake of the existing political system. For example,
after the international financial crisis hit in 2008, the international market oil prices
fell sharply. In 2009, as the oil revenues dropped, the Rouble depreciated, the rate of
inflation rose, domestic product competitiveness fell and the international capital fled
away. At that time, as the government of prime minister, Putin rapidly took
intervention measures such as spending one third of the country's foreign exchange
reserves to stabilize the Rouble (Zuo P 2015). Although his measures stabilized the
Daniel Treisman, in his article "Putin's popularity since 2010", says that because
of the dissatisfaction with economic and political outcome, Russians have begun to
david.hezy@gmail.com He 10
increasingly blame Putin's regime; and Putin's approval rate falls. What people want
are not only higher wages but also justice and dignity, especially for those who come
from new creative class. The opponents of Putin exist in almost all different groups
(Treisman 2014; 384). Of course, economics still play an important role. Treisman
claims the linkage between respondent's views of Putin and perceived economic
performance are tighter. Russians like concrete benefits much more than vague hope
now, focusing more on their living standards. He thinks although large reserves and
high oil price can give Putin some room to maneuver, if the situation of economy
becomes worse than people thought, "the political effects may be pronounced" (385).
Now, with the slump of oil and natural gas prices, the Rouble has depreciated.
and thus western countries impose economic sanctions. The depression of Russia's
revenues from oil and gas exports decreased sharply (fastFT 2016). People who
take dim views on Russia's economy have increased dramatically since the end of last
year. In 2016, the Russian economy is expected to shrink from 0.5% to 1% (Chance
2016).
Many observers are worried that, although Russia has reserves of nearly 90
billion dollars (Harrison, 2014), hammered by a slump in oil prices beginning in 2014,
Russian government may run out of its reserves and will be forced to introduce an
extreme austerity policies by the end of this year. To save Russia economy from the
oil crisis, Putin intends to sell state-owned assets; meanwhile, he reduces government
david.hezy@gmail.com He 11
spending sharply. Low oil prices will continue to intensify Russia's economic decline,
and Putin's dictatorship may have damaged the economy's ability to recover from this
shock.
wallets. Based on the report by Institute of Social Analysis and Forecasts of Russia,
“in February 2016 Russians' real income in comparison to the same period in 2015
had declined by 6.9 percent and real salaries had declined by 2.6 percent” (Kostyrev
2016). Because on the one hand, the rouble exchange rate and the price of oil fell to
a historical bottom, on another hand, it suffered from the price of mutual sanctions
which prohibit doing business with western countries. With almost all food prices
have risen, the Russian banking also granted more loans than the same time last year,
only to fulfill citizens’ daily basic needs. As people’s lives are becoming tougher, how
long Putin can hold is still unknown, but sooner or later, this would largely damage
With the economy recession taking place in Russia, both domestic and western
critics have implied more frequently that Russia is now at the very edge of turmoil,
even collapse. With the gathering of destabilizing forces, a thunder storm is about to
come. In this situation, large-scale riots are very likely to occur, thereby failed
Certainly, some cultural factors could make Putin continue to control Russia,
burying the possibility of western democracy. Right after the collapse of the Soviet
david.hezy@gmail.com He 12
Union, Yeltsin announced that Russia was no longer a unified ideology, people began
to have blind faith in western values of democracy and freedom. Since Putin was in
power, the ideology of Russian had been rebuilt, emphasizing patriotism and the idea
of being a powerful country. The cultural heritages of Russian are messianism, such as
imperial thinking, traditional expansion, respect for authority etc (Zuo F 2008). These
are all based on a strong country and the willingness of become even stronger.
Russian people focus on their national honor more than their individual happiness.
Putin verbally expressed his value of respecting for freedom, human rights and
democracy, nevertheless, he put the goal of pursuing the great powers as his first
mission. Paying attention on patriotic and powerful education was agreed by the
majority in Russia.
determined by the features of Russia's economy, culture and geopolitics.In the entire
history of Russia, the ideological tendencies and the state policies all depended on this
consciousness. Even today, it still plays a decisive role. Putin insists that the purpose
of inheriting the heritage of history is to seize the future. In Putin’s point of view, only
through advocating the legacy of outstanding values and patriotic tradition from
fathers in the youth could unite the power of next generations to fight for national
power and win the country's future. Since 2001, the Russian Federal Government has
promulgated outline of the national patriotic education every five years (Zuo P 2015).
At the beginning that Putin reached the apex of power, Russia needed his
iron-fisted and tough political style to eliminate confusion for the future. He used to
david.hezy@gmail.com He 13
be the only hero the country could rely on. In the minds of Putin's proponents, what
they need was not a so-called democracy, but a strongman who can take sense of
security back and restore the once-mighty empire. It seemed as if stability and
prosperity brought by such strongman politics were enough to compensate for the lack
of democracy and freedom, but the strongman politics is not democratic after all. The
authoritarianism.
The reason why there are always term limits in all democratic systems is that
the system designers knew that there is no guarantee that a person could own a kind
character all the time, no matter how distinguished and capable he is. Most
nature" that power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The
longer a ruler serves, the bigger the power he has. With more chances to be tempted,
the possibility of corruption and abuse of power becomes greater. More dangerously,
if a leader serves long enough, his power may be large enough to subvert the
Since Putin makes no secret of his favor of dictatorship, this causes a split
among the youth who once had blind faith in him. The new generation in Russia is not
satisfied with the status quo, they begin to learn more about the outside world through
the network. In the twenty years since the Soviet collapse, Russians' real incomes
have increased, but democratic institutions have not kept up. Corruption is rife,
freedom is limited and democracy is denied; the Russians have good reasons for
david.hezy@gmail.com He 14
political disaffection, especially today, under the economic recession led by the sharp
fall in the price of oil and sanctions from the west. More and more middle-class and
young generation require social changes. The way to meet their requirements is most
reform, especially political one, with the aim of pushing Russia's democratic
development forward. In other words, Putin is under great pressure from people to
change the state system. To be a great power, which is also the Russian masses
pursued, Putin has stressed that Russia has to concentrate on developing the economy
and strengthening military power, winning widespread approval of the Russia people
who have nationalism tradition. However, the slowness of democratization will arouse
strong discontent among the people, making economic development more difficult. So,
how to advance democratic reforms in the next 5-10 years is not only a problem for
Works Cited
Chance, Matthew. Apr 20, 2016. "Russian oil CEO: We won't do deals with OPEC"
CNN.
(http://money.cnn.com/2016/04/20/news/economy/russia-oil-opec-lukoil-alekpe
rov/)
No.1: 78-81.
fastFT. Jan 25, 2016. "Russian GDP contracted 3.7% in 2015." The FINANCIAL
TIMES LTD.
(http://www.ft.com/fastft/2016/01/25/russian-gdp-contracted-3-7-in-2015/)
(http://news.ifeng.com/history/shijieshi/special/zuofengrong/detail_2011_12/21
/11479436_0.shtml)
Harrison, Virginia. Dec 17, 2014. "Ruble jumps as Russia moves to support banks."
CNN.
(http://money.cnn.com/2014/12/17/news/economy/russia-ruble-stabilizes/)
Kostyrev, Anatoly. Apr 21, 2016. "Russians now spending half of their income on
(http://rbth.com/politics_and_society/2016/04/21/russians-now-spending-half-o
f-their-income-on-food_586753)
Pam, Philip P. Dec 31, 2008. "Russia's Medvedev Signs Constitutional Amendment to
(http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/30/AR20081
david.hezy@gmail.com He 16
23000839.html)
Peng, Zuo. Jun 17, 2015. "Transition of Russia for 15 years under Putin." Journal of
(http://www.tradingeconomics.com/russia/gdp-growth-annual)
Treisman, Daniel. Feb 2014. "Putin's popularity since 2010:why did support for the
Vinik, Danny. Jul 23, 2014. "Chart: Russia Is Insanely Dependent on Oil and Gas
(https://newrepublic.com/article/118827/russias-natural-gas-and-oil-exports-are
-68-percent-total-exports)
Xianyu, Bai. 2005. "Russian election and electoral system in period of democratic
Zhen, Xu. Jan 2008. "The Russian presidential elections during the transitional