In this course, Peter Kenez, Professor Emeritus at UC Santa Cruz, explains the events of modern Russian history and introduces its most significant actors—from Vladimir Lenin to Vladimir Putin.
The Rise of the Oligarchs
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Do curso por University of California, Santa Cruz
Russian History: from Lenin to Putin
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Reform, Stagnation, Collapse, Rebirth?
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Peter KenezProfessor Emeritus
History
The fundamental flaw in the political system was a lack of public involvement.
Once again, the great changes which occurred did not come about as
the expressed desire on the part of
the Russian or Soviet population for bringing about these changes.
What was happening was powerlessness in
a large scale and a fear of dissent into anarchy.
In the early 1990s,
two centers of power emerged.
One was of course Yeltsin,
who had been elected as president of the Russian Republic.
And the other center was the legislature, the Duma.
The problem was that the Duma had been elected,
that is the Russian Duma,
was elected in early 1990 and at that time people who were elected,
86 percent of them were actually had been members of the Communist Party.
That is, by and large these people were
not partisans of the drastic transformation of the economic,
political and social life which was happening around them.
And so, around Yeltsin in the early 1990s,
came into being a group of genuine reformers.
And this as mentioned before,
the outstanding figure here was the economist Yegor Gaida,
who stood behind the idea of shock therapy.
So, the reforms such as withdrawing support,
subsidies from not functioning factories which obviously caused
immediate pain was resisted by the legislature.
Now, both sides had valid points to make.
In as much as the fear of the pain caused by the reforms in the one hand.
And on the other, an understanding that in hope of a better future,
we have to go through this painful process.
That there is no great economic transformation which can be carried out painlessly.
Consequently, the legislature, headed by Khasbulatov,
who actually in 1991 was a comrade of Yeltsin resisting the coup,
and Rutskoy who was the vice president elected together with Yeltsin in the 1990 election,
came to be opponents of the reforms of the ideas introduced by the president.
And the situation became unsupportable in
as much as the two centers of power at them the contradictory policies.
And the legislature was resisting Yeltsin.
Yeltsin and his people wanted to introduce
a very much needed new constitution which would
be relevant to the drastically changed circumstances.
The legislature was resisting this.
And the reason that they were resisting is because this would
have meant the dissolution of the parliament,
and since they had cushy job in the parliament which they were compensated,
and they had very little chance of being re-elected,
they resisted the idea of a constitutional referendum carried out.
Ultimately, this came to a head in 1993,
when Yeltsin dissolved the parliament,
attempted to dissolve the parliament,
the parliament then attempted to remove him from his office,
impeach him and ultimately,
the White House which was the place for the parliament resisted Yeltsin for some days.
There was a crisis which Nababia resolved.
Ultimately, the people in the parliament attempted to take
over the television and this was resisted and ultimately,
the Yeltsin supporters, the army,
which supported Yeltsin besieged
the parliament and the deputies were staying in that building.
And for the first time,
unlike at the time of the dissolution of the Soviet Union,
and actually the military conflict took place,
and the White House was besieged and ultimately,
the parliament was dismantled and the constitution
of plebiscite for a new constitution was taking place.
It was a part of the law that
the plebiscite would have to have at least 50 percent participation.
Now, according to the Yeltsinites,
53 percent participated, and consequently,
the new constitution was valid.
According to outside observers it is questionable.
That there was such a high turn up,
and perhaps the constitution was adopted by unconstitutional means.
The constitution created a strong president.
The issue which was discussed in the early 1990s,
whether Russia should be a parliamentary republic,
which after all, most Western European countries were,
or a presidential republic.
An example of the goal is France or the United States.
And in fact it came to be
a presidential republic in which the president had far reaching power.
The problem was that the Yeltsin who shot himself,
the charismatic and able leader, in 1990,
was not the person who had the right temperament,
the right ideology,
in order to be an effective president in the vastly changed circumstances.
He was a wrong man for the job.
In fact in the course of the 1990's he obviously,
evidently, for everyone to see, deteriorated.
His drinking bouts became known.
On occasion, he appeared drunk in public,
to the extent that this was an embarrassment,
especially when something like this took place abroad.
There was a famous incident when in Berlin, he was drunk,
and the orchestra which played for his welcome,
he took the baton from the orchestra and attempted to conduct the orchestra,
and it was a considerable embarrassment for the Russian people.
He was also increasingly ill. His heart,
maybe the consequence of his excessive drinking,
maybe aside from that,
was giving him trouble, operated on.
And, in general, to the end of the 1990's,
he projected the image of someone incapable.
So the political order which emerged was,
there was now a newly elected parliament,
but the parliament did not have well functioning parties.
The two major parties were the Communist Party, which re-established itself,
and explicitly aimed for reestablishing the Soviet Union,
and a Nationalist Party,
which paradoxically called itself a Liberal Democratic Party,
but in fact was led by a charismatic but obviously demagogic figure.
And this Parliament had
a better functioning relationship with
the president and the ministers appointed by the president,
but nonetheless, Russia had failed to establish
a well-functioning political system operating with the president and legislature.
When it came to elections in 1996,
Yeltsin's popularity declined to such an extent,
that according to surveys he had less than 10% support.
The major opponent was the head of the Communist Party, Gennady Zyuganov.
And so consequently there was considerable fear
among the newly emerging commercial class,
people who had done so well,
that it might be in the next election,
the president would be a communist,
and the Communist Party would come back to office.
The way they dealt with this problem was
that they gave money to Yeltsin.
They gave money with this scheme of loans to the government,
loans to the state,
which would be covered by shares of still government owned enterprises.
In reality, it was understood by everyone that
the state would never be able to repay these loans.
And the loans then, and the factories,
the valuable economic assets such as oil,
various other natural resources,
because this was at this point the most valuable part of the Soviet economy,
would go into private hands.
Now when privatization took place in the early 1990's,
not a great deal of wealth could be created,
and some people could become very rich.
At the second stage of privatization,
these shares for loans came to be an even more scandalous attempt,
and successful attempt of corruption,
of getting hold of valuable assets for something very little.
But this had two consequences.
One is that Yeltsin was able to rally.
He made an attempt to show bigger
and had a great deal more financial resources than the opposition,
and consequently managed in 1996 to be re-elected
and win in a closely contested affair.
One consequence. And the other was the appearance of
a new layer of what came to be called Oligarchs.
A handful of extremely rich people who
were able to buy up television stations, oil wealth,
and other natural resources,
and they came to be intertwined with politics and economics to an extraordinary extent.
And consequently by the end of the 1990's
the Russian political system did not develop in
such a way as to provide the necessary protection for the people of the country.
And the hostility which this newly
created very rich people created among the population as a whole,
further undermined the very questionable faith of
the Russian people in creating a well-functioning capitalist system.
And consequently, it is fair to say that
the 1990's was a period in which the Russian people suffered a great deal.
And the idea that this would result in a better future was increasingly hollow.
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