Оn January 23 the prime minister and presidential candidate Vladimir Putin published in Nezavisimaya Gazeta another policy article called ‘Russia: the national question. Self-determination of the Russian nation: a multi-ethnical civilization sealed with the Russian cultural core.’ It seems that Putin covets Lenin and Stalin’s laurels, known in the post-Soviet space as “experts” in solving national questions. It is known that Lenin wrote the article called ‘Working Class and the National Question’ and Stalin wrote the article ‘The National Question and Social Democracy.’ Everyone remembers well the results of this national policy whose consequences are still felt by all the countries put into the “prison of nations.”
Just like his predecessors Putin thinks that the national question “is fundamental for the country.” He admits that the national question in Russia is a burning issue, first of all, because of the “expenditures caused by the mass migration.” In his characteristic style the prime minister starts the article with criticizing the “multi-cultural project” in the West. “Actually, they suggest speaking about the compulsory assimilation,” he warns and starts discussing the Russian question with a preliminary declaration that “despite the similarity of appearance our situation is absolutely different.”
Putin writes that Russia cannot be a mono-ethnical state; however, he remarks that “today people are seriously worried and even irritated by large expenditures caused by the mass in- and external migration.”
Then he moves to one of his favorite topics: the catastrophic consequences of the USSR collapse. “Our national and migration problems are directly connected to the collapse of the USSR that actually was Great Russia whose base formed back in the 18th century,” this is a starting point of Putin’s article.
The Russian prime minister thinks that the Russian people and the Russian culture have to become the “pivot and bonding agent of this unique civilization.” “Various provokers and our enemies are doing their best to tear this pivot out of Russia holding insincere conversations about Russians’ right for their self-determination, ‘racial purity’ and the necessity to ‘finish the work of 1991 and finally destroy the empire scrounging off the Russian people’ in order to finally make people destroy their homeland with their own hands,” Putin notes.
The Day addressed the Ukrainian and Russian experts asking them to comment the article published by the Russian prime minister whether it really suggests the solution of the national question.
COMMENTARY
The nationwide values have not been formulated…
Igor CHUBAIS, director Friendship of Nations University’s Russian Study Center, Moscow:
“Briefly, I can see the mistakes in the initial problem formulation. I think he is equally brilliant at speaking and writing. Putin says that Russia has been a multi-national state for a thousand years. However, the notion of the nation appeared at the end of the 19th century. Russia was a multi-confessional country.
“When Putin says that the nationalists threaten to tear the county into pieces as it was in 1991 there is a question: what has he been doing for all this time? Now he says that there is a new threat of disintegration. With this declaration he demonstrates the senselessness and absolute inefficiency of the current Russian authorities. Moreover, I would say that the current system cannot be reformed it: it cannot be adjusted or improved. It was miraculously preserved after 1917 and there were repeated attempts to destroy it: the white movement or the civil war during the World War II, resistance in GULAG and dissidents.
“In 1991 it seemed that his regime collapsed, however, it survived. Now it is the time to finish the nomenclatorial and bureaucratic power and return Russia to the Russians.
“The national problems exist because the nationwide values have not been formulated. There is not any all-nation or all-Russian idea. In a house without the roof everyone is trying to save their room. But Putin declared that looking for the national idea is a popular fun. He refused to search for the nationwide values. Only when these values are detected, declared, and accepted during a democratic discussion since they cannot be imposed, then all nations and groups will feel themselves in a common house.
“To some extent the ethnic problems are favorable for the current authorities. It is known that in Stalin’s time the whole nations were deported: the Chechens, Ingushs, Crimean Tatars, Kalmyks, etc. By the way, the Ukrainians from western Ukraine suffered the most. Now they are conducting the policy of anti-deportation when the whole ethnic groups from Central Asia are being attracted to Moscow. Moscow’s look is changing. However, as a result of the fact that there are a lot of people who came from Kirgizstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan there are certain conflicts between these ethnic groups and the locals. A lot of people forget that all the problems originate from the inefficient management and that the federal authorities have to be changed and take it out on each other instead. This approach allows the authorities distracting the society from the real problems. Not very progressive people think that it is Kirgizs’, Georgians’, and Tajiks’ fault. In fact, the Kremlin is to blame for everything.
“If we analyze the thesis that ‘the Russian nation is state-forming’ it was true to some extent. Russian has become the language of all nations. However, today and after 1917 the Russian nation cannot be state-forming since it does not have the needed leverage and mechanisms. The power belongs to the top bureaucracy and not to the nation. When one enters the top bureaucracy, this ruling group, they lose their nationality since they work not in favor of the national interests but in favor of this small group that has been making Russia over the last 90 years. It is true that the role of the Russian nation is significant but you cannot hear any Russian songs on the Moscow radio or television, you cannot see any folk dances, there are no folk museums. The current authorities do not need it.
“There is the top bureaucracy, denationalization, and culture without any background. If you watch television, it shows the pop culture which is not implanted. The songs our pop singers sing can be translated into English and sung in Australia, Canada, Liberia or Ireland. They are not Russian songs. It is the international style, globalization actively used by the authorities since the national culture is disappearing. For example, over 30,000 villages have disappeared in our country and the national culture, national language come from villages, land, roots and depth. The base for shaping the national culture is being destroyed. That is why we have such a deep national and ethnic problem.”
