Por Anders Åslund, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, is the author of The Last Shall Be the First: The East European Financial Crisis, 2008-10. Traducción: Esteban Flamini (Project Syndicate, 28/08/2012).
Mostrando las entradas con la etiqueta Rusia. Mostrar todas las entradas
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sábado, septiembre 01, 2012
Wanting to look tough in Pussy Riot case, Putin instead looks afraid
For Frida Ghitis, a world affairs columnist for The Miami Herald and World Politics Review. A former CNN producer/correspondent, she is the author of The End of Revolution: A Changing World in the Age of Live Television (The Miami Herald, 26/08/2012).
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his backers may believe they won a victory by putting away the three rabble-rousing, rocking girls of Pussy Riot, but they are mistaken. The biggest loser in the high-profile battle between the increasingly authoritarian president and their inventive opposition was the president’s carefully cultivated image.
If you can’t beat him, mock him. That seemed to be the tactical decision by the handful of Pussy Riot members, who might have remained in obscurity or faded away altogether had authorities tackled them with less vigor.
Instead, the authorities grabbed onto their unquestionably crude and profane 40-second performance, when they rushed to the altar of Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ Our Savior last February and gave a rendition of Mother of God, Cast Putin Out, and turned into a major political event.
With the three charged with a major crime, rather than ticketed for disturbing the peace, their video Punk Prayer became a hit and their legal plight a global cause célèbre.
Putin made a show of saying he hoped the court would show leniency, but the case would not have proceeded without Putin’s full and enthusiastic backing.
In the short-term, Putin may get a domestic boost. Sure, many in Russia were outraged by the punk rockers’ antics. But the case reinvigorated the opposition and further tarnished the already-dismal image of Russian democracy.
In the end, the legal victory does not make Putin look strong. It makes him look like a bully.
By the time Judge Marina Syrova found the three — Yekaterina Samutsevich, 30, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, 22, Marina Alekhina, 24 — guilty of hooliganism motivated by religious hatred and accused them of sacrilege and blasphemy, the pro-Putin establishment had accomplished a number of questionable feats.
First, lest we ignore the obvious, they managed to make the words “Pussy Riot” trip off the tongue with surprising ease. Clearly, the punk collective made a brilliant move by choosing the iconoclastic name. The name, incidentally, is the same in Russian, hinting that an international audience was always in the plan.
Second, and more important, Putin has made himself look petty and afraid. Putin, you might say, got scared of a bunch of girls. Otherwise, why would he allow or prompt the legal and security establishment to launch a massive case over a silly song, prosecuting the women all the way to a prison sentence?
The man who so carefully worked to build a fearless image, broadcasting pictures of himself hunting tigers in Siberia and riding shirtless on horseback, looks a little smaller today.
Second, the government’s anti-“Riot” campaign turned the balaclava-wearing protesters into international celebrities and brought global media attention to Russia. We don’t know how much talent these musicians have, but already the likes of Paul McCartney, Madonna, and Sting have lined up behind them. Every word of support for them, for free speech, is a spear thrown in Putin’s direction. When world-famous artists turn against you, the questions will lodge in people’s minds. This case will boost anti-Putin forces, particularly among the young.
Third, Putin and the establishment that mobilized to convict the rockers, complete with a 2,800-page indictment and two-week trial, reinforced an international image of Russia as a place where the rule of law is easily manipulated. The grotesque exploitation of the system in the case of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, and a number of prosecutions of Putin critics had already started drawing that image. The case of Pussy Riot shined an even brighter spotlight on the troubling weaknesses of the country’s legal system. And the case’s vaguely ironic showbiz allure brought it to a much wider audience.
The Russian president has decided to crack down hard on the opposition despite having easily won a third term as president in the most recent election. Samutsevich, Alekhina and Tolokonnikova now join a number of opposition figures feeling the weight of Putin’s heel on their necks.
Despite electoral irregularities and biased press coverage in the run up to the elections, Putin is the legitimate president of Russia and can still claim a mantle of democratic authenticity. But that mantle is becoming increasingly thin.
A compliant parliament has approved anti-democratic measures, making it expensive and dangerous to participate in public demonstrations. Those who challenge Putin often find themselves the target of prosecutors. Most recently, opposition leader Aleksei Navalny was charged with embezzlement.
After the case of Pussy Riot, more people should and will pay attention to the important Navalny case.
And more people will question why exactly Putin is so afraid of the opposition; why he is so afraid of three young women armed only with microphones.
Fuente: Bitácora Almendrón. Tribuna Libre © Miguel Moliné Escalona
martes, agosto 21, 2012
The Wrong Reasons to Back Pussy Riot
For Vadim Nikitin, a journalist and Russia analyst (The New York Times, 21/08/2012).
From Madonna to Bjork, from the elite New Yorker to the populist Daily Mail, the world united in supporting Russia’s irreverent feminist activists Pussy Riot against the blunt cruelty inflicted on them by the state. It may not have stopped Vladimir Putin’s kangaroo court from sentencing them to two years in prison on charges of hooliganism, but blanket international media pressure helped turn the case into a major embarrassment for the Kremlin.
Yet there is something about the West’s embrace of the young women’s cause that should make us deeply uneasy, as Pussy Riot’s philosophy, activism and even music quickly took second place to its usefulness in discrediting one of America’s geopolitical foes. Twenty years after the end of the Cold War, are dissident intellectuals once again in danger of becoming pawns in the West’s anti-Russian narrative?
Back in the ’70s, the United States and its allies cared little about what Soviet dissidents were actually saying, so long as it was aimed against the Kremlin. No wonder so many Americans who had never read Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s books cheered when he dissed the Soviet Union later felt so shocked, offended and even betrayed when he criticized many of the same shortcomings in his adoptive homeland. Wasn’t this guy supposed to be on our side?
Using dissidents to score political points against the Russian regime is as dangerous as adopting a pet tiger: No matter how domesticated they may seem, in the end they are free spirits, liable to maul the hand that feeds them.
How many fans of Pussy Riot’s zany “punk prayer” in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova’s erudite and moving closing statement were equally thrilled by her participation, naked and heavily pregnant, in a public orgy at a Moscow museum in 2008? That performance, by the radical art group Voina (Russian for “war”), was meant to illustrate how Russians were abused by their government. Voina had previously set fire to a police car and drew obscene images on a St. Petersburg drawbridge.
Stunts like that would get you arrested just about anywhere, not just in authoritarian Russia. But Pussy Riot and its comrades at Voina come as a full package: You can’t have the fun, pro-democracy, anti-Putin feminism without the incendiary anarchism, extreme sexual provocations, deliberate obscenity and hard-left politics.
Unless you are comfortable with all that (and I strongly suspect 99 percent of Pussy Riot’s fans in the mainstream media are not), then standing behind Pussy Riot only now, when it is obviously blameless and the government clearly guilty, is pure opportunism. And just like in the bad old days, such knee-jerk yet selective support for Russian dissidents — without fully engaging with their ideas — is not only hypocritical but also does a great disservice to their cause.
A former Soviet dissident and current member of the anti-Putin opposition, Eduard Limonov, knows such cynicism too well. Thrown out of the Soviet Union and welcomed in New York as a Cold War trophy, Limonov soon learned that it wasn’t the dissent part that the United States loved about Soviet dissidents, but their anti-communism. A bristly and provocative anti-Soviet leftist, he got to work doing what he did best — taking on the establishment — and quickly found himself in hot water again, this time with the Americans. Limonov concluded that “the F.B.I. is just as zealous in putting down American radicals as the K.G.B. is with its own radicals and dissidents.”
At the core of much of the media fever over Pussy Riot lies a fundamental misunderstanding of what these Russian dissidents are about. Some outlets have portrayed the case as a quest for freedom of expression and other ground rules of liberal democracy. Yet the very phrase “freedom of expression,” with its connotations of genteel protest as a civic way to blow off some steam while life goes on, is alien to Russian radical thought. The members of Pussy Riot are not liberals looking for self-expression. They are self-confessed descendants of the surrealists and the Russian futurists, determined to radically, even violently, change society.
Anyone who has bothered to see them beyond their relevance as anti-Kremlin proxies will know that these young people are as contemptuous of capitalism as they are of Putinism. They are targeting not just Russian authoritarianism, but, in Tolokonnikova’s words, the entire “corporate state system.” And that applies to the West as much as to Russia itself. It includes many of the fawning foreign media conglomerates covering the trial, like Murdoch’s News Corp., and even such darlings of the anti-Putin “liberal opposition” establishment as the businessman and anti-corruption campaigner Aleksei Navalny.
Pussy Riot’s fans in the West need to understand that their heroes’ dissent will not stop at Putin; neither will it stop if and when Russia becomes a “normal” liberal democracy. Because what Pussy Riot wants is something that is equally terrifying, provocative and threatening to the established order in both Russia and the West (and has been from time immemorial): freedom from patriarchy, capitalism, religion, conventional morality, inequality and the entire corporate state system. We should only support these brave women if we, too, are brave enough to go all the way.
Fuente: Bitácora Almendrón. Tribuna Libre © Miguel Moliné Escalona
From Pussy Riot, a lesson in the power of punk
For John Harris, a journalist and author, who writes regularly for the Guardian about a range of subjects built around politics, popular culture and music (The Guardian, 20/08/2012).
The heritage of protest and provocation on which Nadezhda Tolokonnikova was drawing was confirmed as soon as I saw her picture. The hair cut into a functional bob, the “No Pasaran” T‑shirt with the clenched-fist logo, her leading place in a band-cum-collective called Pussy Riot – it was as if she had been plucked from the Anglo-American subculture known as riot grrrl circa 1992, and dropped into modern Russia.
This time, though, the surrounding contexts had been changed beyond recognition. As with their antecedents, Pussy Riot are young feminists with a scattershot critique of their society, but their chosen target and awful predicament place them almost in a different universe – as proved when Tolokonnikova and her two co-defendants laughed as they were given their two-year sentences. You could call such behaviour “cool”, but in this instance, another word is surely required: one that mixes jaw-dropping bravery with impossible insouciance, and has – as far as I know – yet to be invented.
In the west, we seem to have forgotten that popular culture once produced people who thought it was their duty to decry some of the most ingrained aspects of their societies, and thereby become lightning-rods for dissent. But the rise to prominence of Tolokonnikova et al proves that outside the UK and US, old ideas can assume new shapes and actually take on even greater power (and survive even an endorsement from that cause-squashing menace Madonna, which takes some doing).
To be a mohican-wearing punk in London is to be a kitsch throwback – but in Indonesia or Burma, it can put you on the receiving end of heinous treatment from the authorities. Similarly, in London or Los Angeles, the legacy represented by Pussy Riot can perhaps only be glimpsed in an abiding strain of female fashion you can buy on any high street, whereas in Russia it will soon be on display in a penal colony.
So, some history. Riot grrrl was the work of a handful of people in Olympia, Washington, and Washington DC, who sought to update punk rock – and, with the US religious right in full cry and women’s rights under attack, apply its noise and fury to the politics of gender. Initially, Riot Grrrl was the title of a fanzine put together by four women who would soon form two bands, Bikini Kill and Bratmobile. The former remain a byword for what followed: the aggression and power of what its makers called “boy rock” being rechannelled by proud feminists, and unapologetic celebrations of the worldview of the female adolescent (hence “grrrl”).
In the UK, the torch was carried by a mixed-gender band called Huggy Bear, who made one unimpeachably brilliant record – Her Jazz, released in 1993 – and gained brief renown for protesting on-screen against the moronic sexism of the woeful Channel 4 show The Word, before they quickly disappeared. For a brief moment, they had the music industry terrified that they knew the shape of the future but had no intention of giving it away.
Obviously, compared with Pussy Riot, these people’s targets were almost comically modest and their supposed subversion often reducible to radical chic, but the lines that link the two upsurges are obvious. Pyotr Versilov – Tolokonnikova’s husband, and thanks to his fluency in English, one of Pussy Riot’s key spokespeople – acknowledges that the collective’s name “is a reference to the riot grrrl movement that arose in the United States in the early 1990s, based on a concept of feminine strength, not weakness”.
In an interview published by Vice magazine five months ago, a Pussy Riot member who identified herself as Garadzha said that “a lot of credit certainly goes to Bikini Kill and the bands in the riot grrrl act [sic] – we somehow developed what they did in the 1990s, although in an absolutely different context and with an exaggerated political stance”. Listen to the new Pussy Riot song they have titled Putin Lights Up the Fires – premiered by the Guardian last Friday. All screeched vocals and granite-hard guitar, it’s a product of exactly the same aesthetic.
Such comparisons, however, shrink next to a much more powerful point. Like the original proponents of riot grrrl, only a thousand times more so, Pussy Riot are an object lesson in what cultural provocation can do, while orthodox politics and protest too often remain impotent – a point always lost on those who would restrict dissent to the usual staid norms. On last Friday’s Radio 4 Today programme, the historian Robert Service played his part to perfection, pompously advising the BBC to “get some sense of proportion”. On he grumped: “There are really serious critics of Vladimir Putin in Russia who deserve our attention much more than these three misguided young feminist rock musicians who have desecrated a cathedral.”
That may be so, but history suggests that it’s the allegedly “misguided” who often make the biggest waves. There were critics of De Gaulle’s France who may have had a greater claim to serious attention than the enrages of May 1968, and republicans who had a more coherent take on the toxicity of 1977′s jubilee celebrations than the Sex Pistols, who so gloriously spoiled the celebrations with a single titled God Save the Queen. But in both cases, it took the daring and creativity of cultural outsiders to crystallise the sense that their societies were not just hopelessly conflicted, but in no shape to go on as they were.
Politics is about increment and compromise; in the cultural sphere, you are free to be as exacting and impossiblist as you please, and thereby say and do things that the moment actually demands. And look what can happen: as the aftershocks of the Pussy Riot case ripple on, even some of Putin’s allies do not know where to look. “Our image in the eyes of the world is getting closer to a medieval dictatorship, though we are not that,” says one of the president’s loudest media cheerleaders: the mask that covers power at its most cynical looks to have slipped, at least.
What does all this tell us? That the Anglo-American world still sleeps, having sent forth cultural archetypes that have exploded all over the world. That in some places, culture actually still matters. And that in the macho dystopia of Putin’s Russia, where everything cultural is political and vice versa, three remarkable women have gone to prison to prove it.
Fuente: Bitácora Almendrón. Tribuna Libre © Miguel Moliné Escalona
lunes, agosto 13, 2012
Putin v. the Punk Rockers
Michael Idov, a former contributing editor at New York magazine, is editor in chief of GQ Russia (The New York Times, 08/08/2012)
Battling the sweaty crowd at the Khamovnichesky court to hear the closing statements in the Pussy Riot trial, I couldn’t shake off the odd feeling that I was in the presence of genuine celebrity. My current job requires me to bump into famous Russians regularly, but I haven’t felt like this once. Yet here, staring at three young women in that absurd glass cage in which the Russian courts insist on keeping defendants, I was star-struck.
The fate of Maria Alyokhina, Yekaterina Samutsevich and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, each charged with “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred” after lip-syncing to a punk song in a church for 40 seconds, has become a certified international cause.
The United States government expressed concern, Amnesty International deemed the women “prisoners of conscience,” and a dozen Western stars — like Madonna, Bjork and even Danny DeVito — sang, spoke, wrote and tweeted their support.
But the hometown opinion on Pussy Riot is mixed at best. Even the liberal response has involved language like “They should let these chicks go with a slap on the ass.” Despite the rapid Westernization of the city elites, the rise of the vaunted “creative class” and the widespread distrust of the state-coddled Orthodox Church, Russians remain distinctly uncomfortable with activist women.
Liberalism in Russia is a peculiar beast. Feeding as it does on the revulsion with “crooks and thieves” in the government, it is closer to Tea Party libertarianism, and it pointedly doesn’t concern itself with what Americans call “issues.”
Gender equality and the rights of ethnic minorities and gays all remain firmly outside of its scope. Indeed, outward Westernization easily coexists with attitudes that could be charitably called conservative: just last week, the owner of a new American-themed, artisanal-popsicle-serving cafe was quoted saying in a promotional interview: “This is a family place. … We’re not interested in a bunch of gays coming in and sharing one cup of coffee.”
Pride parades remain banned in Moscow, while opposition leaders freely use the Russian word for “faggot” in public. The idea that liberalism is partly about upholding someone else’s liberty — including their right to do something that’s personally offensive to you — is an exotic and untested notion in Russia.
This allows Russian commentators to say or write things like “these women disgust me, they should rot in jail” without noticing the clear line between opinion and law that separates the first thought from the second. Many prosecution witnesses — mostly church staff members — unnecessarily doubled as “victims”; the defense, for its part, has spent its precious cross-examination time asking questions like “Doesn’t Christ teach you forgiveness?”
The Pussy Riot trial is Russia’s Nazis-in-Skokie moment, its Hustler v. Falwell, but it is unfolding amid universal disregard for the letter of the law. A case that should pivot on a specific legal question (“Does a violation of church protocol rise to the level of religious hatred?”) instead hangs entirely on emotions, including those of Patriarch Kirill I and President Vladimir V. Putin, that the judge and the prosecution appear to be trying to divine. The debate about the trial has also been full of pointless syllogisms: What if it was your daughter up there? What if they tried doing this in a mosque? What if someone came into your house and defecated on the carpet?
The crap-on-carpet scenario has curiously emerged as the favorite arrow in the rhetorical quivers of Pussy Riot’s detractors. In the past week, I’ve seen and heard it perhaps two dozen times. Pussy Riot is the flash point where logic and law run head-on into the old-school Russian “nadryv” — a kind of plaintive hysteria that grips the culture every so often.
Of course, if the defendants decided to convey over-the-top remorse (by falling to their knees, crying, etc.), then public opinion and even their legal fortunes would almost certainly turn. But Ms. Alyokhina, Ms. Samutsevich and Ms. Tolokonnikova remain cool, smiling and remote — a “Western” and “unfeminine” attitude. When you’re a woman in Russia, nothing but tears will do.
But there is another aspect to what’s happening, beyond the obvious judicial overreach and possible political persecution. Pussy Riot marks the outer edge of Russian culture. And in this sense, today, they are the biggest, most important artists in the country.
This has nothing to do with the quality of their music; judging it on artistic merit would be like chiding the Yippies because Pigasus the Immortal, the pig they ran for president in 1968, was not a viable candidate. The fact that Moscow can produce a loud feminist action collective inspired by the punk rock band Bikini Kill and Julia Kristeva is as edifying for the West as it is dumbfounding to most Russians.
This helps explain why little high-profile support for Pussy Riot has come from Russian artists. Zemfira and Mumiy Troll, the biggest names in Russian rock, demurred from commenting when asked. Their silence may be partly rooted in Russian rock’s forced political neutrality: when the best-paying gigs in town are private shows for Kremlin-friendly oligarchs, rebellion is not a hot topic.
For more overtly conservative stars, silence wasn’t enough. “I’ll personally drink to the health of the judge who’ll slap them with some jail time,” Vaenga, the country’s preeminent singer of sugary ballads, wrote on her Web site. “What’s so great about Pussy Riot that all these international stars should support them?” wrote Valeria, a veteran pop singer who’s staged several attempts to break in to the West herself. “They must be saying this because someone ordered them to.”
If you detect a touch of envy, it’s because, for all their radicalism and their misfortune, Pussy Riot has become a sweeping pop success. Madonna has performed “Like a Virgin” with the words “Pussy Riot” etched on her bare back; covers of “Punk Prayer” are multiplying; the collective’s signature headwear is becoming the new Guy Fawkes mask. There’s even a “chapter” of Pussy Riot in Olympia, Wash., the birthplace of Bikini Kill.
Modern Russia’s mass culture, unlike its universally recognized classical canon, has always suffered from a well-deserved inferiority complex. Despite being awash in money, the Putin-era music industry hasn’t had a crossover hit since the days of t.A.T.u.
Yet finally, just as many have dreamed, there is a Russian band on the covers of major European newspapers and magazines — a band with an edgy name, a catchy look and a compelling story. Except it’s not a band at all. And instead of a world tour, its members are facing prison sentences.
Fuente: Bitácora Almendrón. Tribuna Libre © Miguel Moliné Escalona
lunes, junio 18, 2012
Tres interrogantes al este de Europa
Por Javier Solana (El País, 13/06/2012), ex Alto Representante de la UE para la Política Exterior y de Seguridad, Secretario General de la OTAN y ministro de exteriores de España, en la actualidad es Presidente del Centro ESADE de Economía y Geopolítica Global y Profesor Principal Distinguido de la Brookings Institution. © Project Syndicate, 2012. Traducido del inglés por David Meléndez Tormen.
Hoy el edificio del proyecto europeo está tambaleándose. Por supuesto, estoy seguro de que la eurozona superará la actual crisis de deuda soberana y que de ella saldrá una Europa más integrada y eficaz. Pero, para llegar a esa mejor Europa, no solo debe resolverse la crisis de la deuda soberana; será necesario sentar bases más sólidas en las relaciones con tres importantes países que se encuentran al este: Turquía, Rusia y Ucrania.
En mi país, fui parte de la generación que vivió la transición de la dictadura a la democracia hace cuatro décadas. Para nosotros, la Unión Europea era un sueño. De hecho, solíamos citar a Ortega y Gasset: “España es el problema; Europa, la solución”.
Sigo creyendo muy profundamente que Europa es la solución, sobre todo para las sociedades que necesitan ahondar —si no establecer— una tradición democrática. Reforzar las relaciones entre Europa y Turquía, Rusia y Ucrania puede ofrecerles muchos de los mismos beneficios que en España siempre hemos asociado con Europa.
Turquía es, por supuesto, ya un candidato a ser parte de la UE, pero las negociaciones de ingreso avanzan muy lentamente, lo que es estratégicamente desaconsejable debido a su gran autoridad en Oriente Próximo. Es de vital importancia para Europa. Desde Siria a todos los países de la Primavera Árabe, la influencia de Turquía es muy importante y una mayor cooperación con la UE no puede sino resultar beneficiosa.
La UE ha creado un canal de comunicación con Turquía sobre asuntos políticos. Sin embargo, no ha hecho posible una solución definitiva para la relación. Mi ferviente esperanza es que se convierta en miembro de la UE, porque un país musulmán, democrático y mayoritariamente joven podría fortalecer la Unión en aspectos fundamentales.
El debate en torno a la adhesión de Turquía se volverá más agitado en la segunda mitad de este año, cuando Chipre asuma la presidencia rotativa de la UE. Para ser francos, Turquía no va a reconocer al Chipre dividido de hoy como el único representante de esa isla. Para complicar más las cosas, se ha descubierto petróleo cerca de la costa chipriota. Cualquiera que tenga planes de perforar en esa área se verá inmerso en una complicada disputa marítima en que Chipre alegará que las reservas se encuentran dentro de sus aguas territoriales, mientras que Turquía replicará que Chipre no posee aguas territoriales, porque Chipre, al menos para los turcos, no existe.
Rusia se ha convertido en un tipo diferente de complicación para Europa. Puede que Vladimir Putin, que ha regresado a la presidencia, sea el mismo que antes, pero Rusia ha cambiado. La reciente ola de protestas en Moscú y en todo el país ha puesto de manifiesto los límites de su poder. Creo que lo entiende, lo que es en sí un hecho importante para la diplomacia en el futuro.
En los próximos días, la formación del nuevo Gobierno de Rusia revelará mucho sobre las relaciones de poder entre conservadores y liberales. En particular, están en juego miles de millones de dólares de propiedad pública, debido a un plan de privatización diseñado por el expresidente Dimitri Medvedev.
En esto, la UE cuenta con un marco —la Asociación para la Modernización que negoció con Medvedev— que podría llegar a ser muy positivo. La adhesión de Rusia a la Organización Mundial de Comercio en 2011 también debería ayudar a asegurar que se atenga a las normas internacionales, como ocurrió con China cuando se unió a la OMC. La adhesión de Rusia al marco jurídico de la OMC tendría que comenzar a hacer que las relaciones económicas con ella se vuelvan mucho más estables y predecibles.
Con anterioridad, el ingreso de Rusia en la OMC había sido bloqueado por Georgia, que levantó su veto el año pasado después de una elegante hazaña diplomática, por la que se estableció un mecanismo de control fronterizo sin reconocer las regiones separatistas de Osetia del Sur y Abjasia como parte de Georgia ni como países independientes. Esta solución, si bien compleja, es un buen resultado para la región.
Dada la magnitud de los problemas actuales y la disfunción de Ucrania, puede que una solución elegante no esté a mano ni sea suficiente. Ucrania, país con el que me he involucrado desde su independencia, ha sido una gran frustración para mí. Fui parte de las negociaciones que ayudaron a lograr una solución pacífica de la Revolución Naranja de 2004-2005. Pero las luchas internas subsiguientes entre los líderes de la revolución, Yulia Timoshenko y Viktor Yushchenko, fueron tan destructivas que Viktor Yanukovich, cuyos intentos de manipulación de las elecciones presidenciales de 2004 dieron origen a la revolución, hoy es presidente y Timoshenko se encuentra en la cárcel.
Para la UE, Ucrania sigue siendo un grave problema. Aún no se ha firmado un acuerdo global de libre comercio y asociación con la Unión, debido a la encarcelación de Timoshenko y otros actores políticos. Afortunadamente, dada la atracción que la Unión ejerce para la mayor parte de los ucranianos, aún hay esperanzas de que un realismo sencillo convenza a Yanukovich y la élite gobernante del país a regresar a un camino que haga posible la firma del acuerdo.
El poder blando de Europa ha cambiado muchas cosas en muchos países en las últimas dos décadas, estimulando a gobernantes y ciudadanos a reformar sus economías y adoptar o reforzar los valores e instituciones de la democracia. Puede seguir haciéndolo en Turquía, Rusia y Ucrania, o bien, por falta de atención e inacción, puede acabar perdiendo credibilidad, influencia y oportunidades económicas.
Fuente: Bitácora Almendrón. Tribuna Libre © Miguel Moliné Escalona
jueves, marzo 01, 2012
Rusia: El Zar se tambalea
Por Mira Milosevich, escritora y Doctora en Estudios Europeos (ABC, 29/02/12):
En agosto del año pasado, cuando vimos las imágenes de Vladimir Putin
sacando dos ánforas griegas del siglo V del mar Negro en Fanagoria,
frente a las costas de Crimea, supimos que esta no era solo una foto más
para su bookegolátrico, donde ya almacenaba imágenes suyas montando a
caballo con el torso desnudo como en una película de Nikita Mijailov,
practicando judo o apagando un incendio desde un helicóptero, sino que
formaba parte de la propaganda electoral para las presidenciales rusas
de 2012. No sorprende que Putin, tras ejercer como presidente entre 2000
y 2008, y como primer ministro desde 2008 a 2012, quiera volver a la
Presidencia durante otros dos mandatos, es decir, doce años más. Si
cumple su aspiración, terminará habiendo reinado en Rusia durante 24
años, seis años más que Brezhnev y seis menos que Stalin. A pesar de la
considerable pérdida de votos de su partido, Rusia Unida, en las
elecciones legislativas del pasado diciembre, en las que bajó del 64%
que había obtenido en 2007 al 49%, y de las protestas multitudinarias
por el fraude electoral, todos los pronósticos le auguran una victoria
en los comicios del próximo 4 de marzo. Así que la cuestión no es si
Vladimir Putin ganará o no las elecciones presidenciales, sino si podrá
mantenerse en el poder tanto tiempo como pretende. El hecho de que Rusia
sea un Estado neoautoritario, disfuncional e incapaz de solucionar los
complejos problemas económicos, sociales, étnicos y demográficos a que
se enfrenta, contribuye a reforzar la hipótesis de que no llegará al
final del primer mandato, pero no ofrece respuestas a la incógnita sobre
lo que vendrá después.
Desde el año 2000, Putin está construyendo un Estado ruso que
constituye por sí solo una nueva especie política, combinación de lo que
él define como «democracia soberana» (sobre el supuesto de que cada
pueblo, según su carácter y tradición, debe poseer su propia democracia)
y lo que calla pero es perceptible en la eliminación física de sus
adversarios, sean periodistas, políticos de la oposición o antiguos
espías. Un Estado, en fin, dirigido y dominado por los miembros del
Servicio Secreto. Ni los Estados fascistas ni la antigua URSS —sin duda,
peores en muchos aspectos que la actual Rusia— fueron controlados en
tal grado por los profesionales del espionaje. Su estrategia política
para las elecciones presidenciales de 2012, al margen de las imágenes
del macho fuerte (que no son cosa baladí en un país donde la fuerza ha
sido y es la base última del poder) y de la retórica sobre la urgencia
de la modernización y de la lucha contra la corrupción, sigue siendo la
misma que desplegó en las presidenciales del año 2000. Su proyecto
político sigue siendo el mismo que entonces, dentro y fuera de Rusia.
Putin llegó al poder prometiendo la «renacionalización»; es decir, la
restauración de la gobernabilidad del país, muy dañada durante los años
de presidencia de Boris Yeltsin. Es cierto que Rusia se deslizó entre
1992 y 1999 hacia la condición de Estado fallido, porque el Kremlin no
dejó de perder influencia sobre las repúblicas de la antigua URSS (algo
bastante lógico, después del colapso del comunismo) y la liberalización
económica desembocó en la corrupción generalizada. Yeltsin, un
excomunista alcohólico de salud precaria, no fue capaz de enderezar
aquella deriva. La campaña electoral de Putin se basó entonces en la
necesidad de «poner orden en el caos reinante». En la actual, el «caos
de los noventa» le sirve de amenaza. Putin o el diluvio. El caos volverá
si no logra mantenerse en el poder, porque él es el Libertadorde Rusia.
No hay que olvidar que, para un antiguo miembro del KGB, la
liberalización democrática supone un escenario incontrolable, un
sinónimo del caos, y «poner orden» significa restringir la libertad.
Como en la campaña de 2000, Putin añade a la insistencia obsesiva en el
mantenimiento del orden un discurso virulentamente antioccidental que
hace de sus opositores cómplices de un frente contra Rusia dirigido
desde Washington, convirtiéndolos así en traidores. Por lo demás, su
programa de política exterior consiste, como siempre, en conservar las
zonas de influencia en las repúblicas exsoviéticas y en los Balcanes, y
en cultivar la imagen rusa de gran potencia, manteniendo el pulso con
EE.UU. y la Unión Europea a través de gestos como el rechazo de la
resolución de la ONU sobre Siria, el apoyo a Hugo Chávez en Venezuela y a
Ahmadineyad en Irán, la negativa al reconocimiento de Kosovo como
Estado y la oposición a la implantación del sistema norteamericano BMD
(Ballistic Missile Defense) en Rumanía (2015) y Polonia (2018).
Vladimir Putin no ha cambiado, pero hay indicios de que el paisaje
político ruso es distinto. Las protestas por el fraude electoral
reunieron el pasado 24 de diciembre a 80.000 personas, y a 100.000 el 4
de febrero. Estas movilizaciones reflejan la indignación creciente de la
ciudadanía rusa, que no acepta las nuevas formas de despotismo,
sospecha que la política actual no puede solucionar los complejos
problemas del país y reclama una alternativa a los clanes del poder del
Kremlin. Las encuestas demuestran que Putin ha perdido Moscú y el apoyo
de la intelligentsia, dos pérdidas a las que ningún régimen ruso
sobrevivió. Así que el zar no solo está desnudo (y no solo de torso),
sino que además su sistema entra en una fase preagónica.
¿De dónde saldrá una nueva fuerza política capaz de articular la
indignación ciudadana y derrocar el putinismo? La situación actual no
tiene precedentes en la historia rusa, porque no se trata de sustituir a
Putin por un nuevo zar que se ajuste a cualquier modelo precedente, sea
el de Pedro el Grande o el de Stalin, sino de convertir Rusia en lo que
nunca ha sido, un país democrático. El zarismoestá arraigado
profundamente en la tradición política rusa, marcada por el
autoritarismo tanto bajo los zares como bajo las dictaduras de partido
único.
A través de su historia, las respuestas a la tiranía han oscilado del
anarquismo a absolutismos de signo opuesto al gobernante. Solo una
nueva cultura democrática podría cambiar a Rusia, pero ninguna de las
tres instancias actuantes en la historia de Rusia —la clase política, la
Iglesia ortodoxa y la intelligentsia— parece capaz de dirigir tal
transformación. La clase política, por razones obvias. La Iglesia
ortodoxa rusa, pasiva y complaciente ante el poder establecido, siempre
ha sido reacia a los cambios. La inteligencia no es en absoluto de fiar,
porque siempre terminó avalando los regímenes anteriores. Como observó
Isaiah Berlín, la inteligencia rusa ha tendido a creer religiosamente en
las ideas, al contrario que en Occidente, donde las ideas circulan
libremente, creando un clima de opinión. Los rusos tienen pasión por las
ideas fuertes y excluyentes, esto es, por las ideologías. El cambio
solo podría llegar desde la propia sociedad civil, que, aunque carece
aún de una clara alternativa al putinismo, está mejor organizada que
hace doce años, gracias a las redes sociales y a los movimientos
cívicos. Si recibiera un apoyo internacional, como Solidarnosc en
Polonia, tendría mayores posibilidades. Rusia produjo el zarismo, un
paradigma autoritario, pero también la disidencia, que lo ha sido de la
libertad individual bajo condiciones extremas de tiranía, como lo
demuestran los casos de Anna Ajmatova, Alexandr Solzhenytsin, Yuri
Sajarov o Anna Politkovskaya, entre muchos otros. El Zar Nicolás I solía
decir que los rusos solo pueden confiar en su Ejército y en su Armada.
Acaso ha llegado la hora de que confíen en sí mismos.
Fuente: Bitácora Almendrón. Tribuna Libre © Miguel Moliné Escalona
La revolución de la nieve
Por Anders Aslund, Instituto Peterson de Economía Internacional (LA VANGUARDIA, 29/02/12):
El régimen de Vladímir Putin está advirtiendo a los rusos que su
incipiente revolución de la nieve será un gran error igual que la
revolución naranja de Ucrania en el año 2004. No obstante, si bien las
similitudes entre estos dos movimientos populares son tangibles, sus
diferencias son esenciales, por lo que compararlos podría ayudar a la
oposición rusa a evitar algunos errores.
Al igual que la revolución de la nieve, la revolución naranja fue una
reacción generalizada de las clases medias en contra de la corrupción y
la falta del Estado de derecho. A diferencia de la primavera árabe, la
revolución naranja fue totalmente pacífica, como lo ha sido la
revolución de la nieve, y ninguna de las dos fue resultado de una crisis
económica o social. En el 2004, la economía ucraniana tuvo un
crecimiento sin precedentes de 12%, y el PIB de Rusia aumentó el año
pasado en un considerable 4.3%. Sin embargo, también hay diferencias
significativas. En Ucrania hay una gran división étnica entre las
personas que hablan ruso y las que hablan ucraniano. La oposición
ucraniana estaba bien anclada en el Parlamento y en los medios de
comunicación, un factor que la hacía parte del viejo sistema.
Los grandes logros de la revolución naranja fueron las libertades
políticas y civiles. Sin embargo, la semiparalización política fue su
peor fallo, que condujo a una mayor corrupción y autoritarismo. Estuve
en Ucrania, antes y después de la revolución naranja, y al pasar un
tiempo en Moscú, noté claramente algunas de las trampas en las que puede
caer la revolución de la nieve.
La revolución naranja fue pacífica porque un número suficientemente
grande de personas tomó las calles. La oposición rusa ya se ha dado
cuenta de ello y ha minimizado el riesgo de violencia.
No obstante, pudo haber sido un error en el 2004 ocupar el centro de
Kiev y continuar con las constantes manifestaciones para provocar una
rápida solución de la crisis porque condujo a un mal arreglo con el
viejo régimen. El alivio repentino provocó una euforia peligrosa y
orgullo en los miembros de la revolución naranja.
Por esta razón, tal vez la oposición rusa está siendo razonable y por
ello realiza ocasionalmente grandes manifestaciones con las que muestra
al régimen su fuerza, pero no presiona para llegar a una solución
inmediata. En efecto, la repentina resolución de la revolución naranja
condujo a la adopción de una Constitución disfuncional que marcaba una
división de poderes confusa y compleja. Parecía una trampa preparada por
los operadores del viejo régimen. No hay razones para repetir ese
error. Una Constitución requiere de un análisis serio. Si el proceso va
demasiado rápido, los adherentes del viejo régimen pueden fácilmente
engañar a los nuevos actores para que asuman compromisos peligrosos.
Otro gran error de la revolución naranja es que Víktor Yúschenko
resultó ser un presidente ineficaz e irresponsable. Al principio viajó
por todo el mundo durante meses para celebrar su victoria ignorando el
caos en su país. Después, empezó a vetar prácticamente todas las
decisiones del Gobierno causando una paralización política y, en la
parte final de su administración, tácitamente se unió a la vieja guardia
(ahora de nuevo en el poder) en contra de la primera ministra, Yulia
Timoshenko, (cuyo partido, hay que reconocerlo, había votado contra la
Constitución.)
Sin embargo, mientras Víktor Yúschenko sirve de advertencia a los
rusos para no elegir un presidente accidental con poderes excesivos, una
de las causas subyacentes de la descomposición del gobierno naranja fue
que la mayoría de sus ministros (nombrados por Yúschenko) pertenecían
al viejo régimen. La mayoría casi nunca se opuso a la corrupción, y los
hombres destacados que fundaron la revolución naranja tenían la
esperanza de obtener ganancias generosas a cambio de su inversión
política. Como resultado, no hubo una limpieza de los viejos cuadros, y
la corrupción disminuyó pero sólo temporalmente.
En contraste, la revolución rosa de Georgia del 2003 conllevó un
cambio general de los altos funcionarios, y se permitió la llegada de
dirigentes jóvenes bien preparados en instituciones occidentales. Rusia
necesita seguir el ejemplo de Georgia (y Estonia) promoviendo una nueva
generación de profesionales calificados, jóvenes y limpios.
El error de política más grave de la revolución naranja fue haberse
concentrado al principio en la reprivatización –renacionalización y
reventa de empresas que se habían privatizado a precios excesivamente
bajos–. El Gobierno naranja dedicó su primer semestre a discutir qué
empresas debían privatizarse y cómo. Mientras tanto, la producción
disminuía cada mes porque la incertidumbre sobre los derechos de
propiedad ahuyentaba a los empresarios. Al final, solamente se
reprivatizó una empresa grande de metalúrgica llamada Krivoryzhstal;
para ese entonces la coalición naranja ya se había dividido. Para los
políticos rusos, la reprivatización es una gran tentación política. De
hecho, los tres partidos de la oposición en la Duma (el Parlamento)
demandan una renacionalización de largo alcance, aunque tendría efectos
políticos y económicos devastadores. En cambio, un nuevo gobierno
democrático pediría mayores impuestos a la propiedad y el enjuiciamiento
de los funcionarios corruptos. En comparación con Ucrania, Rusia tiene
una legislación digna y sus tribunales económicos son respetados.
La razón fundamental por la que es de esperar que haya avances
democráticos más exitosos en Rusia que los que hubo en Ucrania en el
2004 es que Rusia es mucho más rica y desarrollada que Ucrania, con un
PIB per cápita (al tipo de cambio actual) cuatro veces superior. Como
habrían observado teóricos de la modernización como Seymour Martin
Lipset y Samuel Huntington, Rusia es sencillamente demasiado rica, bien
preparada y abierta como para ser tan autoritaria. De acuerdo con la
oenegé Freedom House, sólo siete pequeños estados exportadores de
petróleo y Singapur son más ricos que Rusia y siguen siendo
autoritarios.
Rusia debería aprender cuatro grandes lecciones de la revolución
naranja a medida que su propia revolución de la nieve continúa. Primero,
los nuevos demócratas deben evitar caer en la trampa de un compromiso
disfuncional con el viejo régimen. Segundo, los dirigentes son
esenciales para un avance democrático sostenible, y esta elección es
tanto vital como difícil. Tercero, Rusia necesita hacer una limpieza de
los funcionarios corruptos, por lo que debería recurrir a su vasta
juventud talentosa y bien preparada. Finalmente, la reprivatización es
una píldora venenosa que hay que evitar.
La revolución naranja no fue un error, pero una causa justa no es
garantía de victoria. Los revolucionarios de invierno rusos deben
asegurar que su lucha es adecuada e inteligente.
Fuente: Bitácora Almendrón. Tribuna Libre © Miguel Moliné Escalona
jueves, septiembre 15, 2011
A Durable Reset
By Andrew C. Kuchins, director of the Russia and Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. He is co-editor of Russia after the Global Economic Crisis (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 14/09/11):
Three years ago this month, after Russian military forces invaded Georgia, the U.S.-Russia relationship reached its lowest point, at least since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Bush administration virtually froze relations for its last five months in the White House.
President Obama and his team took office in January 2009 and soon signaled their interest in improving ties with Moscow. The main reasons are well known: need of Russian support in trying to curtail Iran’s nuclear weapons program; increasing U.S. military presence in Afghanistan; and return to a more multilateral approach in nuclear arms control and security.
Despite considerable skepticism in Moscow and Washington, Obama and Russian President Dmitri Medvedev have made significant progress in restoring the bilateral relationship with important achievements on all the issues above as well as a number of others.
In recent months, however, critical voices in both countries have grown louder about prospects for further rapprochement. Skeptics point to disagreements over missile defense, the revolutionary events in the Middle East, the seemingly never-ending negotiations over Russia’s W.T.O. accession and other issues. Some analysts and political figures in both countries also cite the possibility that Vladimir Putin will return as Russia’s president in 2012 as a threat to future cooperation.
But unlike the two previous U.S.-Russian honeymoons, both of which ended in disappointment — in 1991-1992 after the emergence of the new Russia, and in 2001-2002 after 9/11 — the current warming trend should be more sustainable.
To understand why, it is instructive to understand the Russian motivations for improved ties with Washington, and also the likely impact of Russian presidential elections on ties with Washington.
Until the autumn of 2008, the mainstream Russian view — expounded by Putin — was of the United States in decline as economic troubles mounted and setbacks in Afghanistan and Iraq sapped U.S. power. By contrast, Russia was on the rise, and a truly multipolar world was emerging.
The unexpected impact of the global economic crisis on Russia in the fall of 2008 struck a blow to this narrative, revealing as it did the vulnerability of Russia’s economic growth. The Russian economy was the hardest hit of all members of the Group of 20, and this sobering event led to renewed efforts to integrate with the West in order to advance the modernization of Russia.
Russian elites also began to acknowledge that the balance of global economic and political power may not be shifting in their favor. After the dust settled from the fall of 2008, Moscow viewed China as having come out on top. After years of focusing on the United States as the source of dangers to Russia, Moscow has become increasingly concerned about the rapid development of China and its growing influence in Russia, especially in Siberia and the Far East, and in Central Asia, the Caspian and other areas that Medvedev has dubbed Russia’s “zone of privileged interests.”
The Russian elections will not fundamentally alter these challenges for Russia. History suggests that American policies will be a far greater factor than Russian politics in shaping Russian policies toward the United States.
The Russian assessment of America’s power and role in the world did not change because Medvedev replaced Putin as president; it changed because of the global economic crisis and Washington’s policies.
Vladimir Putin, contrary to conventional wisdom, is not deeply opposed to U.S. interests. In 2001-2002, Putin pursued his own version of a “reset” in American-Russian relations, and his foreign-policy orientation at that time was at least as amenable to U.S. interests as Medvedev’s today.
True, Russia’s confidence strengthened as its economy recovered, but Moscow’s disappointment with the policies of the George W. Bush administration was a greater factor in Putin’s increasing willingness to oppose Washington. So the possibility of Putin becoming president again — and I have no idea whether he will — should not be feared in Washington.
The Russians are aware of the current fiscal problems in the United States, and the questions about whether the U.S. political system is capable of managing them. They are also closely watching whether the United States has the political commitment to stabilize Afghanistan.
The Russian elites are unsure about the durability of U.S. power, but they have seen the United States renew itself in the wake of global and economic setbacks in the past.
If the United States succeeds in making progress on these fronts and, more importantly, continues to pursue pragmatic policies that accommodate some of Russia’s core interests, the current trend toward cooperation will continue. Or, to put it another way, we are the critical variable in this equation.
Fuente: Bitácora Almendrón. Tribuna Libre © Miguel Moliné Escalona
sábado, junio 11, 2011
Coming in From the Cold War
By Charles A. Kupchan, professor of international affairs at Georgetown University and a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 08/06/11):
At Wednesday’s meeting of NATO defense ministers with their Russian counterpart, the Western alliance will seek to win Russian support for and cooperation in a European missile-defense system.
Moscow’s assent would constitute a major step toward rapprochement between NATO and its former enemy, advancing the cause of anchoring Russia firmly in the Euro-Atlantic community.
Moscow is no longer vehemently denouncing any and all U.S. talk of missile defense and instead appears ready to explore ways to merge its own evolving system with NATO’s. Nonetheless, the issue is far from settled and, if not managed carefully, has the potential to scuttle the progress already made in resetting Russia relations with the West.
The nub of the problem is that Moscow fears that NATO’s missile-defense system could eventually threaten the efficacy of Russia’s nuclear deterrent.
Although Washington has made amply clear that the system is targeted against Iranian missiles and that it would in no way degrade Russia’s deterrent, Moscow remains unconvinced. It has therefore asked for binding assurances that would limit the scope of NATO’s system. Washington justifiably rejects the notion that Russia should dictate the parameters of NATO missile defense — the mere suggestion of which is enough to prompt a riot on Capitol Hill.
The United States has sought to alleviate Moscow’s concerns by making Russia a stakeholder in the evolving system. Through sharing technology and building linkages between the NATO system and Russia’s, Washington contends that Russia would be able to divine the benign nature of U.S. plans and enjoy the additive benefits of working with the NATO system.
Russia, however, envisages a level of cooperation that goes well beyond what NATO has in mind. The U.S. is prepared to share only so much sensitive technology with Russia, and NATO would hardly countenance arrangements that would give Russia operational control of its system. Especially for NATO members hailing from Central Europe, sharing privileged technology or command authority with Russia is tantamount to letting the fox in the hen-house.
Wednesday’s NATO-Russia dialogue will hardly resolve this stalemate. The bottom line is that Russia does not yet trust the United States or NATO enough to give a green light to Washington’s plans. Nor do Washington and its NATO allies trust Russia enough to fling open their doors and make Russia an equal partner in their missile-defense system.
Nonetheless, NATO and Russia should map out a concrete work plan that enables them to gradually build common ground on missile defense. Already in the works is an effort to draw up a legal framework for increased sharing of technology between the United States and Russia. Once in place, this arrangement would enhance the transparency of NATO’s missile-defense plans and give Russia more confidence in U.S. intentions.
NATO and Russia should also establish “fusion” centers where they can share relevant data, coordinate missile threat alerts and even exchange information on targeting inceptors. Establishing a joint research center on missile defense offers another vehicle for deepening NATO-Russia collaboration.
Orchestrating a breakthrough on missile defense will require more than incremental progress on technological and operational cooperation. Such progress must be backstopped by a broader effort to continue deepening ties between Russia and the West.
For starters, both parties should make more of the NATO-Russian Council, the main forum for consultations between the alliance and Moscow. NATO members must do a much better job of making the council a vehicle for real give and take and the incorporation of Russian concerns into NATO decisions.
In return, Russia must stop using the forum for theatrical obstruction and instead capitalize on the opportunity for deliberation and cooperation.
NATO and Russia can also deepen mutual confidence and trust by advancing concrete collaboration on many fronts. Russia can enhance its assistance to NATO’s efforts in Afghanistan. Having succeeded in concluding the New Start Treaty to reduce their nuclear arsenals, the United States and Russia can now focus on conventional arms control. More contact between U.S. and Russian armed forces would be especially helpful in diluting the mutual suspicions left behind by the Cold War. In addition, there is plenty of room for more NATO-Russia cooperation on peacekeeping, naval operations to combat piracy and drug trafficking and cybersecurity.
The United States and the European Union should continue to develop their economic linkages with Russia. The more integrated Russia is into Western markets the greater incentive it has to lay to rest its strategic rivalry with the West. Finalizing Russia’s entry into the World Trade Organization would advance this agenda.
Should NATO and Russia succeed in reaching an accommodation on missile defense, there will still be tough disagreements ahead, including over the future of NATO enlargement and the status of Georgia’s breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Nonetheless, a durable reconciliation between NATO and Russia is as last becoming a realistic prospect. A deal on missile defense is not yet at hand. But Wednesday’s meeting can help lay the foundation for that deal, moving Europe closer to finally including Russia in the post-Cold War settlement.
Fuente: Bitácora Almendrón. Tribuna Libre © Miguel Moliné Escalona
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