HOW DO YOU SLAY A DRAGON?

The Stalinists usually fend off the ethical argument by saying that democracy has also not always been whiter than white, that democratic revolutions frequently were accompanied by masses of victims. And to the economic argument they answer that the fatal lag in the economy took place in the post-Stalin period.

Some people may feel that the Stalinists are right, and that the potential of the totalitarian society for modernisation was truly unlimited. But this impression swiftly disappears when you take into account the long historical perspective.

It doesn’t actually appear as if Peter I and Stalin each reached great heights in the economy once they had the country under their control. But towards the end of their lives, just one or two generations after they began their reforms (between 20 to 40 years), stagnation set in that it was impossible to resist. And the roots of this stagnation clearly lay in “the period of great victories”. Ultimately, it could be seen that these “victories”, as consequences of the revolution, turned out to be the reasons for the backwardness of the system. Thanks to the authoritarian nature of Russia’s modernisation, the country developed from revolution to revolution, along the lines of “one step forward, two steps back”. And as the centuries passed, the upheavals, like a pendulum, swung back and forth ever stronger. There’s no point in making the usual comparison between authoritarian modernisation now with the way it was done in centuries past; we need to compare how effective authoritarian and non-authoritarian modernisation has been over long periods of time.

In places where democracy ruled, development happened much more evenly, with fewer swings of the historical pendulum. And over long periods of time this gave society a massive head start. The people’s patience wasn’t exhausted under the yoke of autocracy, nor did it explode into a bloody civil war, nor turn into appalling apathy witnessing the endless rule of gerontocratic leaders. One set of politicians just peacefully took the place of another, one political course was exchanged for another, and society merely tacked against the wind of the various hardships that life brought.

Again and again, Russia has been put in the position of trying to catch up, as a result of all the sacrifices that were placed upon the altar of authoritarian modernisation. This is where Russia is now once more. With a long historical perspective, if we look far into the distance instead of simply looking under our feet, we can see that for Russia there is no alternative to democracy. Otherwise, sooner or later another swing of the pendulum of revolution will simply destroy Russia as a state. And a massive swing of this pendulum can be avoided only with the help of democracy. But the question is, what sort of democracy does our country need, and how can we build it with the minimum of cost?

This task has to be solved on two levels at once. Firstly, Russia has to construct a democratic foundation; to do what was done long ago in Western Europe. But just catching up with the West isn’t enough. We have to take into account the new challenges that have arisen. Modern Western democracy is experiencing serious difficulties and is now seeking the answers to these problems. There’s no point in our first creating the democracy of the nineteenth century (which is what everyone is trying to do) and then trying to re-shape it for today.

The classic form of democracy no longer works anywhere. It’s time has passed. In the information age, the methods of political mobilisation that were invented in the middle of the nineteenth century are both pointless and useless. Every day we see how the old system of political parties is stagnating and is no longer capable of fulfilling its function. In Russia we must immediately build democracy for the twenty-first century, leaping at one go over two steps and proving correct the words of the Evangelist, that those who are last can become the ones who are first.

What does “creating a democratic foundation” mean in Russia? There are hundreds of definitions of democracy in the world and dozens of different theories. I don’t intend to put forward a principally new version, nor will I just repeat certain banalities. One way or another, the type of society that’ll be considered as democratic will be the one where society  has the last word when it comes to taking political decisions; the whole of society, including its minorities. Not just a part of society, that for some particular reason has the right to vote, such as by material wealth, education, ethnicity and so on, but the whole adult and capable population of the country.

In this sense I shall always be suspicious of democracy in countries where there are too many people who are not treated as citizens, whatever the historical background to this might be.