Russia Turns the Corner

Stephen Sestanovich

From Foreign Affairs, January/February 1994

Summary:  Despite apparent anarchy, Russia is passing three important tests for establishing a democracy. The military is acquiescing in the new democratic order, the old managers of the economy are losing their political grip, and the new regime has come to embody patriotism and legitimacy in the mind of the populace. A fledgling Russian republic may succeed where the Weimar Republic failed.

Stephen Sestanovich is Director of Russian and Eurasian Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

TAKING WEIMAR SERIOUSLY

Drug dealers, gangsters, flagrantly corrupt bureaucrats, destitute pensioners, an embittered intellectual class--it is sorry figures like these who increasingly shape our image of Russia. Together, they are thought to have made the recent electoral victory of Vladimir Zhirinovsky and his neofascist party almost inevitable. They give weight, moreover, to forecasts of grimmer things--unappeasable popular anger, the collapse of public order and eventually dictatorship.

New democracies in danger always call forth comparisons with the doomed Weimar Republic, and there is no denying that the analogy is useful for thinking about Russia?s prospects. But, it is only useful if we take the similarities, and differences, seriously enough. The Weimar record teaches more than the lesson that well-organized, charismatic thugs can feed on social distress. It is a reminder to look at political fundamentals and beyond the mood of the moment to the institutions, interest groups and issues that define the new regime.

Over the long term, Russians have to create what they call a "rule of law" state, based on legal norms consistently applied. Without progress in this direction (and Boris Yeltsin?s new constitution is a major step forward), any democracy remains precarious. Yet here again the Weimar analogy can keep us from too narrow a focus. Germany in the 1920s was both a Rechsstaat and a highly vulnerable democracy, and its fatal weaknesses suggest how Russia, too, could lose its way. German generals endured civilian rule, but they adapted to it little and identified with it less; the industrialists who had produced decades of rapid economic growth under the Kaiser saw their achievements threatened in the Weimar years; worst of all, fascist ideologues were able to say that liberalism was a byproduct of national defeat and could never restore German greatness.

If Russian democracy is to take hold, it must succeed where the Weimar Republic failed. It must build support among crucial constituencies and neutralize issues that could be its undoing. Three tests of success stand out. The first concerns the armed forces: Do those who control the instruments of coercion accept the new order? The second test has to do with economic transformation: What is the political balance of power between those who want to hang on to remnants of the command economy and those who expect to do well in the market? Finally, there is the problem of legitimacy: Does the new regime embody traditional patriotic values, or are its domestic and foreign policies seen as a threat to national identity and pride?

Russian democracy has to defend and define itself in these three areas--the politics of force, the politics of money and the politics of patriotism. These were the crucial battles that the Weimar Republic lost. By contrast, Russia?s democrats have begun to win them. Their progress does not mean that the danger of fascism can be ignored; the December elections allow no such complacency. But the political achievements of the past year mean the new regime that the fascists want to destroy has put itself on a more secure footing. It goes into the battle stronger than many think.

THE POLITICS OF FORCE

To many observers, post-communist civil-military relations pose a dilemma from which democratic leaders cannot escape: they are damned if they rely on the army and damned if they do not. The past year has vividly illustrated both halves of this problem. In December 1992, when Yeltsin made his first open challenge to the parliament, by calling unexpectedly for a referendum to test popular confidence in the executive and legislative branches, he was forced to back down almost at once--not least because the military immediately expressed its neutrality, which was universally read as a sign of opposition. Yet when Russian Defense Minister Pavel Grachev abandoned his neutral pose and ordered tanks to the White House, the question raised by many analysts was whether Yeltsin could ever extricate himself from his deal with the devil.

This is the wrong way to look at the military?s decision to take sides. What happened in the past year was not the slow emergence of a deal with Yeltsin, but something far more important--the growing realization within the high command that its own fate is inseparable from that of Russian democracy. This is still a provisional result, but the fact that it occurred at all--particularly in light of the antidemocratic leanings of many generals--is extremely important for understanding where Russia is headed over the next five years.

How did it happen? Part of the answer is that there is hardly any institution of the new Russia under more acute stress than the army, and Yeltsin has been prepared to make a great many concessions to the military--from pay, perks and promotions to the interpretation of arms control treaties. Marginal inducements of this kind matter (Grachev was quoted not long ago as saying that the generals would "fight" for their dachas), but bribes alone cannot make the armed forces an ally of Russian democracy. Perhaps the single most important factor in fixing the high command?s pro-Yeltsin orientation has been, ironically enough, the strong latent opposition to him in military ranks.