In the November issue of Reason, Russian emigre Cathy Young writes a long, nuanced analysis of Putin’s Russia. The whole thing is worth reading. It’s titled “Dissent and Disarray in Putin’s Russia.” Underneath the title is the brief summary: “The authoritarian’s hold on power may be shakier than it looks.” Young does a good job of showing the ways in which dissent is repressed and the ways in which it’s not. I can’t do justice to those nuances in a short space. That’s why I recommend reading it for yourself.
Young is, as far as I can tell from this and other of her writing I’ve read over the years, a libertarian. Why do I mention that? Because there are some strange parts of the article. They wouldn’t be strange if this were written by someone with no identifiable ideology. But they are strange when one considers that the author is pro-liberty. I’ll point out the main two.
First, in one of her opening paragraphs, in which she compares life in Russia today with life in Russia under Leonid Brezhnev, she writes:
Now, as then, large segments of the population enjoy mostly oil-enabled material comfort relative to previous generations (even if the 1970s version of comfort, in which a color television was the height of luxury, bananas were a rare delicacy, and a trip to Crimea was a dream vacation, looks like squalor in the 2010s). Now, as then, there is a relatively mild authoritarian regime with occasional spikes of repression (even if the level of freedom in modern-day Russia, where dissidents can sell books and virtually all content is accessible on the internet, would have been unthinkable in Brezhnev’s USSR). Now, as then, there was a stagnant stability and a cynical national mood, with no visible alternatives to the existing system.
In other words, things are much better now for the average Russian. But she hides this contrast with her “Now, as then” formulation. Dissidents can now sell books and “virtually all content is accessible on the internet.” She admits that that was unthinkable during Brezhnev’s time. That’s huge.
But notice something else. By her “Now, as then” formulation, she builds her own Procrustean bed in which she can’t fit one of the biggest, if not the biggest, freedoms that Russians have now and didn’t have then. It’s one that I would think someone who left Russia in 1980 would notice. That freedom is the freedom to leave. One of the best indicators of a repressive government is its use of force to make people stay. Think, for example, of the East German government’s obscene Berlin Wall. Yet, Young says not a word about this freedom.
Second, she has a lengthy discussion of Vladimir Putin’s moves to raise “the retirement age from 60 to 65 for men and from 55 to 63 for women over the next 15 years.” In context, it’s clear that she doesn’t mean the retirement age. She means the age at which Russians get their version of our Social Security benefits. Young, like many good journalists, does not comment on the wisdom or desirability of that proposal. But then she drops a bombshell and doesn’t even seem to realize it’s a bombshell. She writes:
One of the biggest protests against the pension reform law so far, a July 29 rally in Moscow that reportedly drew nearly 6,000 people, was organized by the Libertarian Party
Say what? One of the few pro-freedom measures Putin is pushing is to reduce the size of the welfare state by delaying the granting of government pensions. And what does the Libertarian Party of Russia do? Advocate that this part of the welfare state remain intact. Surely, in a libertarian magazine such as Reason and in an article by someone who presumably left Russia at least in part for the greater freedom she would have in the United States, that fact is worth commenting on. The sentence I quoted was the most depressing sentence I’ve read all week. And that’s in a week when I’ve read a lot about Kavanaugh and Ford.
One additional point. Young writes about the medical system:
The state of the health care system remains deplorable, with chronic shortages of painkillers and other medicine. Horror stories of understaffed hospitals with crumbling walls and ceilings, dirty bedsheets, overflowing toilets, and rude or drunk personnel appear with depressing regularity and often go viral on the internet.
Unfortunately, she never tells us about the structure of the health care system. She seems to take it for granted that we know. Is it government run as in Britain? Is it single payer as in Canada? Is it a mix of private and government, as in most places. The reader will walk away from this article not knowing.
It’s a pity. The article is quite good in laying out the details of repression—and absence of repression—of freedom of speech and dissent. But it has the major pitfalls that I’ve laid out above.
READER COMMENTS
Michael Byrnes
Oct 8 2018 at 9:50am
Daivd, you should send her this link, I’d be very interested in her response and continued discussion.
David Henderson
Oct 8 2018 at 12:37pm
I did.
Michael Gray
Oct 8 2018 at 3:59pm
Thanks for this piece, David, and the link. One point on which I’d challenge you is the value of “freedom to leave”. I’ll grant you that Cathy Young herself left Russia and the Berlin Wall made a potent statement, but in practice just how feasible and attractive is it for the ordinary citizen to get up and go, leaving behind everything – family, friends, community, memories and much more? It would be for most an extreme and courageous step. An individual globalist might romanticise this freedom, but anyone with ties in their nation would not. From Australia where I live, New Zealand might be an option (but not under Jacinda Ardern!), but nowhere North of here. You might consider Canada or England, but would you consider anywhere South of the US? It’s related to the “somewheres” v “anywheres” tension. This also helps explain some of the antipathy to Yoram Hazony’s book on Nationalism – a romantic, unrealistic view of Globalism.
David Henderson
Oct 8 2018 at 6:46pm
Thanks for this piece, David, and the link.
You’re welcome, Michael.
I’ll grant you that Cathy Young herself left Russia and the Berlin Wall made a potent statement, but in practice just how feasible and attractive is it for the ordinary citizen to get up and go, leaving behind everything – family, friends, community, memories and much more? It would be for most an extreme and courageous step.
It’s more feasible and attractive than at any other time in history. I’m sure you’re familiar with the stories of the millions and millions of people who left Europe for the United States from the late 1800s to about 1920. They gave up everything. Virtually all were convinced that they would never go back and by and large they were right. Now, you can work here for a couple of years and make enough money not only to pay your living expenses but also to buy a round-trip ticket home.
Christian LeBlanc
Oct 8 2018 at 4:54pm
The fact that a freedom exists may be more important than whether anyone feels the need to exercise it.
David Henderson
Oct 9 2018 at 10:27am
Good point, in the sense that it’s endogenous. Especially in this case. The very fact that one is free to leave is a strong constraint on government.
Mikk Salu
Oct 10 2018 at 1:44am
May I ask, what makes the sentence you quoted the most depressing? What makes it depressing – the fact that Russian Libertarian Party is organizing protests against the pension reform law? Or the fact that Russian society is culturally so paternalistic, that only time when people are willing to protest is the time when Putin goes after welfare-state?
David Henderson
Oct 10 2018 at 12:51pm
The former.
But see Kalinichenko Herman’s comment below.
Kalinichenko Herman
Oct 10 2018 at 12:06pm
Hello David, I’m a Russian Libertarian and I would like to clarify why Libertarian Party of Russia (LPR) opposes the pension reform. The main purpose of the reform was not to make pension system more sustainable or cut taxes or spending – in fact, the reform was coupled with a tax raise. Also, Russia doesn’t have a problem with government deficits like US. There reason it was done, of course, was to shift the funding from the budget to the oligarchs. It’s better when taxpayer gets at least some of his money back, than when Putin’s cronies get it through state contracts. That’s why LPR opposed the pension reform.
For the record, LPR advocates for abolishment of state pension system, repaying everything to current pensioners, and abolishing related payroll taxes.
David Henderson
Oct 10 2018 at 12:57pm
Thanks.
I’m glad you oppose the state pension system. The usual way to do that, though, is to wind it down, and one obvious way is to increase the age at which pensioners receive benefits. Imagine the age for receiving benefits, to take an extreme case, were raised to 100. Problem solved. So for you to oppose this is to play with fire.
I understand your upset at Putin’s cronies. My guess, though, is that preventing the increase in the age for receiving benefits will do little to reduce the subsidies to Putin’s cronies.
Finally, I don’t know the numbers well enough, but I’m virtually positive that repaying everything to current pensioners will be very hard to do if you at the same time abolish payroll taxes. Also, do you advocate not paying anything to those who have paid in for decades but are not pensioners? I’m not suggesting that you’re wrong if you advocate this approach; I simply want to understand.
Kalinichenko Herman
Oct 10 2018 at 2:58pm
Yeah, I should’ve mentioned that those who have paid in would recieve their share too. About the fiscal concerns: it would be additionally funded by money raised from privatization of state enterprises.
Also, to be honest, the protest was a PR move. The pension reform is such a huge issue for Russian society that simply by taking the “wrong” side (not suggesting it’s actually wrong or right), LPR would lose the opportunity to capitalize on anti-pension reform sentiment, and LPR desperately needs new members. Yeah, I agree this is playing with fire and can lead to abandonment of libertarian principles – I for example am not happy with LPR’s change from pro-open borders to anti-immigration.
Ken Perepelkin
Oct 14 2018 at 7:35pm
I enjoyed reading your take on Cathy Young’s article – your criticisms were apt and relevant, however your response to Michael Gray’s comment missed an important point.
It’s more feasible and attractive than at any other time in history. I’m sure you’re familiar with the stories of the millions and millions of people who left Europe for the United States from the late 1800s to about 1920. They gave up everything. Virtually all were convinced that they would never go back and by and large they were right. Now, you can work here for a couple of years and make enough money not only to pay your living expenses but also to buy a round-trip ticket home.
While it is certainly true that today economic opportunities abound in the US, the immigration pathways to get there are much harder to navigate than they were in the late 1880’s and early 20th Century. The reality is that unless you have been specifically invited by a company with a written contract to hire you, you are more likely to find yourself on the next plane back to Russia.
Russians seeking refugee status still have to demonstrate “persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution” in their home country “on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.”
https://www.uscis.gov/ilink/docView/SLB/HTML/SLB/0-0-0-1/0-0-0-29/0-0-0-101/0-0-0-195.html#0-0-0-959
They can’t simply say, “I’m poor and want to work.” In recent years the number of Russians seeking refugee status has increased but it is a depressing fact that many of the current refugees seeking asylum are doing so because of feared persecution due to their sexual orientation, a consequence of 2013’s “for the Purpose of Protecting Children from Information Advocating for a Denial of Traditional Family Values Law” or the “Anti Gay” law as some call it.
Many young smart hard working Russians I know would love to move to the US and work – it just isn’t that easy to do. The Green Card lottery (which President Trump trying to cancel) is limited to 50,000 people worldwide. The total applicants for that lottery in 2017 was 22.4 million!
Having freedom to move isn’t enough in this day and age. America no longer wants “your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.” That time has passed.
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