On Wednesday, more than 2,000 guests gathered in the Grand Kremlin Palace to attend unprecedented ceremony in Russian history; the passing of power from one leader to another. The departing Russian president Vladimir Putin gave up the top job in the country not because of a natural cause (death or illness) or because he was forced to leave (a military coup), but because he voluntarily chose to do so.
Indeed, Putin will not disappear from the Russian political scene. Rather, he will remain as powerful as he ever was; and will ensure his formal authority by clinging to the position of prime minister. Yet, given his enormous popularity and the undisputed legitimacy he has earned, Putin could have easily violated the constitution to allow himself to run again for the presidency. He chose not to imitate leaders of the Third World, however, because he leads a superpower.
For a country such as Russia, which has lived under autocracy for centuries and has never experienced democracy, this must be seen as an achievement. The establishment of an institutional political system in a traditional society will not be Putin's orphan accomplishment, indeed. He will be also remembered as the father of modern Russia. Part of his legacy will be exhibited this weekend by a triumphant military parade in Red Square of a sort not seen since the Cold War years, complete with flyovers of strategic bombers and rumbling columns of tanks. The parade is meant to suggest that Russia under Putin has recovered from its severely weakened state.
In the early 1990s, following the fall of Communism and the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Russia descended gradually into complete anarchy. It was a society in ruins going through disastrous times. When Putin assumed power in 2000, succeeding Boris Yeltsin, few expected him to reverse the gear and change the fortune of his country from a defeated, poor and indebted nation into a strong and relatively rich one.
International standing
For the past eight years, the Russian leader has been working quietly to bolster his country's international standing and reinvigorate its capabilities. Early into his second term, he became better equipped to challenge the US and its allies, who have been meddling in Russia's strategic sphere and ignoring its national interests since the end of the Cold War. He has made the best out of his country's massive natural wealth; paying off much of its foreign debt and building a $700 billion hard currency reserve. Meanwhile, he played host to leaders at odds with Washington, such as Aleksandr Lukashenko of Belarus, Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran.
One should be careful however to assume that Russia seeks to get involved in another confrontation with the West. In fact, Moscow needs western technologies, markets, and trade partnerships to modernise its underdeveloped economy. This should be the main challenge for the new Russian president Dmitri Medvedev, who needs to combat inflation, the poor state of public infrastructure and endemic corruption. Medvedev's key objective should be diversifying the sources of income for his country. As the world's largest energy exporter, Russia is completely dependent on its oil revenues, making it extremely vulnerable to market forces. In addition, he needs to deal with the dwindling oil production, resulting mainly from Russia's old infrastructure largely dates to Soviet times. The huge investments required to develop the oil industry would create more inflationary pressures, causing another problem for the Russian economy. According to economists, inflation has already topped 13 per cent, spreading dissatisfaction and worry among Russians. The cost of living has hence soared, pushed upward by a real estate bubble and climbing prices for utilities, gasoline and food.
The new Russian president and his powerful prime minister need to deal with these problems before thinking of posing any challenge to the West. They may have to holdback further democratic measures, should that be seen necessary to consolidate the gains of the past decade. The West might not like this approach, but it does like the Russian way of democracy anyway.
Dr Marwan Kabalan is a lecturer in media and international relations, Faculty of Political Science and Media, Damascus University, Syria.
