The ruling class has run into a perplexity it created on its own. On the one hand, there is governable life based on the apathy of some people and petty pragmatic readiness of others. On the other hand, the rulers have to retrieve the genuinely creative sections of society from dormancy. Governable life no longer satisfies the rulers themselves, while the unpredictability of awakening forces frightens them.
Political dormancy and indifference have engulfed the Russian people who have turned their energies to the realm of material rather than political ambitions. The consumer boom is rolling through the country, in some places energetically – occasionally even glamorously.
“Indeed, Putin’s conduct is the one of an absolute monarch,” a top official from the Kremlin remarked frankly. “But you have to govern all that manually and on a daily basis if you want to keep it under control. Forget about any system in the next 20 to 30 years, until the time when people who are 18 to 20 years old today come to power.”
There is a general consensus that it is time for Russia to make a breakthrough into the future. It is almost perfectly clear today what needs to be done, and equally clear how it should be achieved. The greatest paradox, however, is that after fifteen years of post-totalitarian development, a question is looming large: who should Russia make the breakthrough with?
The ruling class has run into a perplexity it created on its own. On the one hand, there is governable life based on the apathy of some people and petty pragmatic readiness of others. On the other hand, the rulers have to retrieve the genuinely creative sections of society from dormancy. Governable life no longer satisfies the rulers themselves, while the unpredictability of awakening forces frightens them.
Political dormancy and indifference have engulfed the Russian people who have turned their energies to the realm of material rather than political ambitions. The consumer boom is rolling through the country, in some places energetically – occasionally even glamorously.
“Indeed, Putin’s conduct is the one of an absolute monarch,” a top official from the Kremlin remarked frankly. “But you have to govern all that manually and on a daily basis if you want to keep it under control. Forget about any system in the next 20 to 30 years, until the time when people who are 18 to 20 years old today come to power.”
There is a general consensus that it is time for Russia to make a breakthrough into the future. It is almost perfectly clear today what needs to be done, and equally clear how it should be achieved. The greatest paradox, however, is that after fifteen years of post-totalitarian development, a question is looming large: who should Russia make the breakthrough with?
When the Baltic countries entered NATO and the European Union a couple of years ago, many thought it was the end of the centuries-old "red line." Euro-Atlantic organizations had crossed into the former Russian and Soviet empires.
In September 2004, the Russian city of Novgorod hosted an international conference entitled Russia at the Turn of the Century: Hopes and Reality. Its organizers were the RIA Novosti news agency, the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, Russia in Global Affairs, and The Moscow Times.