Discussions about Russia’s Future Should Be Open-Ended Lest They be Used to Frighten People into Backing Current Arrangements, Luzin Says

(Paul Goble – Window on Eurasia – Staunton, December 12, 2019)

Discussing Russia’s future, including its possible transformation into a federation or confederation or even disintegration, is useful, Pavel Luzin says; but only if those taking part in it are open to considering multiple possibilities. Otherwise, any suggestion, such as radical decentralization of disintegration may only frighten people.

The recent talk about what might happen if Russia fell apart along the lines of the existing federal districts is a classic example of this, the regionalist thinker says. It is based on the idea that Russia must be either as it is or fall apart according to existing territorial divisions, neither of which exhausts the possibilities (region.expert/confederation/).

Focusing only on the federal districts is especially counter-productive, Luzin says. Not only were they created to impose tighter control over governors and drawn to cut across Soviet-era economic zones, but the FDs haven’t taken off politically (region.expert/academy/ and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2019/09/could-borders-of-russias-north-west.html).

“Today,” Luzin continues, “no one except local journalists forced to cover the visits to them [by Moscow leaders] in their regions remembers the names of the plenipotentiary representatives in them.” Consequently, discussing them in isolation as a model for the future of Russia “makes no sense.”

Other possible regional models should be considered, including Natalya Zubarevich’s “four Russias” and the possible reemergence of regions long suppressed by Moscow and not reflected in the current territorial-political division of the country (region.expert/zubarevich/ and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2019/08/zubarevichs-four-russias-once-again-at.html).

It is also useful, Luzin continues, to consider Russia in terms of a model of the continuing disintegration of the empire, although on many occasions, advocates of such a development underrate and opponents overrate the possibilities of this given the infrastructure matrix linking most of the republics together.

But if the Russian Federation is unlikely to disintegration as other empires with which it is sometimes compared, “de-colonization is occurring here as well” through rapid urbanization, a trend pointing to the shifting of political power and wealth “toward the regions and cities or more precisely in favor of the city-regions now in the process of being formed.”

Not everyone will like that and many may fear its consequences, but one aspect of the former British Empire may be instructive: the fact that its former dominions, Australia, New Zealand and Canada, “having a common political and cultural background continue formally to recognize the power of the British crown even though they are thousands of kilometers away.”

“In other words,” the Russian regionalist says, “the decentralization of Russia” given its diversity is likely to proceed in more than one direction and discussions that suggest all of the territory will move in the same one are wrong and certainly less about prediction than intimidation against those who want change.

“Each subject of the continental archipelago of major cities into which Russia is gradually being transformed in the frameworks of a decentralized model of administration will gain the opportunity to develop their own political experience” regardless of whether they stay within a single market or political system or not.

What is important, Luzin argues, is that every discussion about Russia’s future be open to the possibility that some of the units in the future will reflect existing political-territorial arrangements while others likely will emerge as new ones given political preferences and population changes.

“We don’t know whether the conception of a confederation is relevant for Russian society. Moreover, even the resettlement of Russians into major cities is a non-linear process and one extending over a long period of time. Put simply,” Luzin says, “we do not know where we are headed to.” Suggesting otherwise is simply wrong.

But there is one thing everyone who would like to see a better future for all those living within the current borders of the Russian Federation, and that is this: “the limitations which have been imposed by the Kremlin over almost 30 years on economic and political initiatives of Russian citizens” must be lifted. Then, we shall see what happens.

[Article also appeared at windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2019/12/discussions-about-russias-future-should.html]