HOW DO YOU SLAY A DRAGON?

The depth of the West’s understanding of Russia’s problems, and the West’s position on this, will play a huge role in the success or failure of the project for a new Russia. The West must choose between an instinctive, superficial approach, and a rational, considered one. Instinctively it’s easier for the West either to dream of the collapse of Russia (giving no thought to the consequent global risks that would bring), or to try to establish an autocracy with which it can have good relations (not taking into account the inevitability that these good relations would inevitably turn sour).

The instinctive reaction is convenient because it doesn’t rely on any participation on the part of the West. It gives Russia the opportunity to continue to stew in its own juice. The rational approach demands efforts from the West, similar to those that the USA took after the Second World War to assist the rebuilding of the political process in Europe. In other words, it means the West being engaged both politically and ideologically. In this the West must also avoid the temptation in the transitional period to split Russia up into separate parts, thus weakening the central authorities’ ability to act as a political arbiter.

Turning Russia into a stable federation is a long-term historical project, and in the first place it’s in the West’s interests. This is not a duty to Russia, but a rational decision, that would make the world order safer and more predictable for a significant period in the future.

Chapter 20. The Legal Choice:

the Dictatorship of the Law or a State Based on the Rule of Law?

If you were to carry out an opinion poll and ask passers-by on the street what they think a state governed by the rule of law is, the vast majority would answer: “it’s a state where people obey the law”. This is close to the truth, but it’s not true! If it were so, the ideal example of a state governed by the rule of law would be the Third Reich. Whatever else, that was a state where the laws were obeyed, and the commandant of a concentration camp who was caught taking a bribe could easily end up as an inmate, although there were cases where corrupt officials were simply transferred to other duties. Anyway, it’s not so much the observance of the law, as it is the nature of the laws themselves.

A state governed by the rule of law is a state where the laws are observed according to certain criteria. What are these criteria? And why is this so important?

From time immemorial, those in power have clothed their will in the form of laws, and demanded that the population obeyed these laws; the people had to bow to the will of the authorities. This is the kind of archaic understanding of what is “lawful” that still dominates in Russia. With their class approach to what was “just”, Lenin and the Bolsheviks didn’t drift far from this archaic understanding. “The dictatorship of the law”, that they so love to talk about in the Kremlin, is the dictatorship of the unbridled wild will of one clan that has usurped power and has had unchallenged control over the Kremlin for more than two decades.

The law and the dictatorship that the Kremlin praises so highly exists for one reason only: to try to give an apparent legitimacy to naked despotism. One of the most unpleasant consequences of such a situation is the inability of the system to adapt to any constructive evolution. Violence simply leads to more violence. And hoping that unjust laws will over time develop naturally into just laws is simply a utopian dream.

Specifically, one of the main reasons why mankind has sought a way of escaping from unjust laws is the desire to avoid revolution as the only way to achieve changes in society.

All of those who have genuinely thought deeply about revolution have understood that it’s a difficult but unavoidable price that society has to pay to history in order to achieve progress. This price became unavoidable specifically because the laws that were in operation were designed in such a way as to prevent any change, in practice or in theory.

It’s from here that the attitude has developed that revolution is a necessary evil. Loving a revolution and wishing for it to happen is as foreign to our nature as it would be to wish pain on ourselves and those around us. (There are, of course, those who do like this and receive pleasure from becoming involved in the chaos of revolution.) But in a hopeless situation, the majority of the population will see revolution simply as a lesser evil.

If life under the old regime becomes intolerable, if all of the internal contradictions associated with this regime are brought together in one unbreakable mess, if all the legal routes point simply to a continuation of this despotism, then inevitably thoughts turn to the sword that can cut the Gordian Knot. This is so inevitable that it isn’t worth devoting a great deal of attention to it.