Contrast the Yeltsin and Putin Presidencies

Philip Brown Candidate No: 020276355 BA History and Politics Second Year PL2002 Contrast the Yeltsin and Putin Presidencies Boris Yeltsin became the first president of the Russian Federal Republic in June 1991, an historic occasion that marked the end of the Soviet Union and communism in Russia. When he resigned as president on New Years Eve 1999, he left behind what one historian preeminently called ‘a formidable legacy.’1 Born in 1931 into a peasant background, his rise to prominence in Russian politics was swift. His political views were seen as quite reactionary and he himself was often seen as a small-scale maverick thanks to his anti-authoritarian views, which is likely to stem from his family’s suffering under the Stalin regime. He was elevated to the Politburo in the mid-eighties by Gorbachev, who wanted to use Yeltsin’s reputation as a trouble-shooter to reform corrupt elements of the Communist Party. His style and exuberant persona made him popular with the Russian people but he suffered in the communist hierarchy, eventually losing status. Yeltsin was also never a man who let the rules get in the way of what he wanted to achieve and he is best described as a political opportunist. He had the ability to uphold authoritarian values when he needed to, but to heavily compromise as well, which allowed him to ‘navigate around formal rules and procedures.’2 This he did to good effect in securing election to the Soviet parliament in 1989 and the Russian Presidency in 1991. Although he used his manipulation skills well, he came to rely on the public on critical occasions such as during the 1991 coup attempt. Vladimir Putin on the other hand appeared to come from nowhere in his rise to the presidency. Born in St. Petersburg in 1952, he attended university and was recruited into the KGB, where he served for seventeen years. It wasn’t until 1990 that he became involved in politics when he accepted the post of international affairs advisor to his former law professor Anatoly Sobchak’s Leningrad soviet, eventually rising to become his deputy mayor in 1994. Two years later after Sobchak’s electoral defeat amid allegations of corruption, Putin was brought into Yeltsin’s administration by Anatoly Chubais, the Kremlin chief of staff. Putin was seen as reliable and loyal and was appointed head of the Federal Security Bureau (FSB), successor to the KGB, in 1998. It was from this position that Yeltsin elevated him to Prime Minister in 1999 and named him as his successor as President. Vladimir Putin became president on 26 March 2000. It can be seen therefore that the emergence of each president was very different to the other. Yeltsin had worked his way through the communist structure over a period of many years and it was his personality as an outspoken critic of soviet authority and his free-talking style that 1 2 E. Huskey, Presidential Power in Russia, (Sharpe, 1999) p.4 Stephen White, Alex Pravda & Zvi Gitelman, Developments in Russian Politics Fifth edition, (Palgrave 2001) p.25 Philip Brown Candidate No: 020276355 BA History and Politics Second Year PL2002 made him popular; the people knew who he was and this was the important thing. He was also very much an individual, who often found himself isolated among political allies in the Gorbachev area but using his popularity to lever himself into positions of power and ultimately the Presidency. Putin by contrast was a relative unknown in 1999, his past shrouded in secrecy and with a relative lack of experience in the political field. He owed his rise very much to connections, for example his relationship with Sobchak and his reputation as an excellent KGB officer. What he did possess in contrast to Yeltsin was a positive and determined image, which was picked up upon by his political colleagues and was to be the main reason for Yeltsin’s approval of his bid for the Presidency. For both Yeltsin in 1991 (less so in 1996), and Putin the future looked encouraging as both men comfortably won the first rounds of elections with a clear majority, giving them both a good political mandate. It is how they both used this mandate that gives another good area for comparison. Foreign policy is a key area for comparison if the two presidents and again the context of each situation is very important. In 1991, Russia as a separate state had two main foreign policy aims: ‘to seek friendly relations with the other soviet republics in a renewed union and to return as an autonomous force in world politics.’3 Foreign policy can be divided therefore into two areas: the near abroad and the far abroad. The near abroad concerns Russia’s relations with the new republics and the far abroad refers to the links with the international community as a whole. By the end of 1991 Russia had swallowed up the Soviet state; all departments of Soviet government were merged with the Russian equivalents or abolished and Russia had taken individual responsibility for the commitments of the USSR on the international scene, including taking their seat on the security council of the UN. This in turn led to an increasingly ambiguous direction to Russian foreign policy. Only a year after pledging a possible re-union with the new republics, Yeltsin addressed the Russian Ministry for Foreign Affairs (MFA) on new policy, but made no indications as to how they were to conduct themselves toward the new republics. Foreign policy in his early days of administration was concentrated on complete acquiescence with the West to secure favourable conditions for rebuilding their archaic infrastructure and to dispel the Cold War legacy. Yeltsin in particular was gambling on the emergence of a second Marshall Plan, but the sheer geographical size of Russia made this an unrealistic hope. Were a post-communist Russia to modernise along the same lines as post-communist East Germany, it is estimated the investment cost would run to 3 R. Sawka, Russian Politics and Society Third Edition, (Routledge 2002) p.350 Philip Brown Candidate No: 020276355 BA History and Politics Second Year PL2002 $1 trillion per year over the same time period.4 Yeltsin’s period of complete acquiescence is best demonstrated by his agreement over the 1991 Gulf War and the sanctions imposed on Yugoslavia. Policy towards the former Soviet republics was therefore neglected and Yeltsin and his foreign minister Kozyrev came under increasing attack by 1993. The period from 1993-96 therefore was a time of reshaped and re-asserted foreign policy as opposed to the idealism that defined the first two years of the new federation. Russia concentrated on national security in the near east and not on guarantees of security from the West. This change came in part from the increasing support that Zhirinovsky was gaining for his nationalists in the build up to the 1996 presidential elections. Therefore an increased interest in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) was introduced, particularly because Russia’s new borders with these countries were weak and ill defined and they were not able to man their borders with Europe and Asia effectively. Overall in Yeltsin’s period, Russia moved gradually away from the West and concentrated on issues closer to home. Relations between the various new republics constantly fluctuated but as a whole improved from 1996 with the appointment of Yevgeny Primakov at the foreign office.5 The war in Chechnya however proved increasingly unpopular at home and internationally, drawing widespread condemnation, forcing Yeltsin to halt the process. Although Putin has only been in power for just over three years it is easy to see an appreciable change in foreign policy. As an election promise he vowed to defend the interests of Russians abroad, restore order in the Northern Caucasus and take a more pragmatic and realistic approach to relations in the west, which meant securing Russia’s great power interests through developing Russian economic interests abroad. The re-commencement of the war with Chechnya began in 1999, but this time to widespread appeal from the Russian people. This was a marked difference to the reaction gained by Yeltsin, but the key to the matter is that Putin actually pledged to work for the displaced Russians abroad and fight what he saw as external security threats in the form of terrorism. As an advocate of the strong state, Putin sometimes allows this over-eagerness to appear unwavering to damage Russia’s appearance on the international scene as seen by the repercussions of the Kursk disaster, the Ostankino fire and the Moscow Theatre fiasco. Putin has in addition improved relations with the Western world as a whole by reaching a decision making agreement with NATO in May 2002, whereby Russia would have the same decision making rights as the 19 NATO states in 4 5 T. F. Remington, Politics in Russia, (Longman 1999) P.180 S. White, Russia’s New Politics, (CUP 2000) pp.239-250 Philip Brown Candidate No: 020276355 BA History and Politics Second Year PL2002 regard to international terrorism without having to integrate itself into the alliance.6 He has also moved towards a closer relationship with China, signing a friendship treaty in July 2001. The contrasting fortunes of each president in foreign policy terms is again indicative of the situations in which each man came to power. With regard to the far abroad, Yeltsin’s administration wavered and often banked on very big assumptions such as the possibility of economic aid in the years 1991-92 and it wasn’t until Yeltsin’s second term in office with a stronger foreign minister that any sense of consistency began to appear. An increasingly active role in the workings of the CIS has been continued by Putin, as has the focus on national security. Putin clearly sees Russia as a powerful nation and it is this that has influenced him most in his decision to not always heel to the demands of the west. Although reaching agreements that prove beneficial to both sides, such as the NATO agreement, he is also unafraid to reconcile with other countries such as China and to oppose major Western (particularly American) offensives such as the second war in Iraq. Next it is necessary to compare how each administration has feared with regard to the economy. Admittedly the contrast here is great. After the 1991 coup, the Russian state was in a morbid state of depression, grain levels were down to a four-month supply, foreign exchange and gold deposits were exhausted and credit worthiness was low.7 The old system had been destroyed and the new one did not exist, in short Russia was stuck without a working economy. Yeltsin’s economic policy of October 1991 included four points:     Economic stabilisation based on tight monetary and credit policy and the strengthening of the rouble. Price liberalisation. Privatisation, a mixed economy and accelerated land reform. Tight control of budget expenditure and reform of tax and banking systems.8 This amounted basically to what is known as economic ‘shock therapy.’ Similar proposals had worked to good effect resulting in years of consistency in Poland, Estonia and The Czech Republic, but its implantation proved to be very grave. The overall effect on the Russian economy was that between 1990 and 1995 GDP fell by 50%. In defence of his policies the Economics and briefly Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar blamed the lack of willingness to see the 6 BBC News Website, Russia Timeline, November 4 2003, (cited 9 November 2003), available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/country_profiles/1113655.stm 7 Sawka, ibid, p.283 8 Sawka, ibid p.282 Philip Brown Candidate No: 020276355 BA History and Politics Second Year PL2002 policies through from the rest of the government. In his opinion, shock therapy had not been shocking enough and that half-hearted measures had produced the lack of growth and increased lack of confidence in the Russian market. In the mid 90’s corruption also began to deprive the economy from any hopes of recovery. Managers illegally transferred control of businesses from the state to themselves by intercepting cash flows and siphoning foreign currency incomes while the economy was trapped in a state between socialist and capitalist. Stabilisation took a long time but began to take shape after ‘black Tuesday,’ of 11 October 1994, eventually reaching dollar stability in January 1998 and inflation reached a tolerable level. This could not last however and the economy crashed in August 1998 due to severe fiscal imbalances, chronic budget deficits and high interest rates. Devaluation of the rouble provoked by this crisis improved the competitiveness of the Russian economy and allowed significant growth to take place. The story of the economy in Putin’s era is in essence closely linked to the slight revival experienced at the end of Yeltsin's reign. In 2000 the GDP increased by 7.6% on the previous year and in 2001 by 5.5%, signs of the post crash revival. Privatisation was continued as Putin took control and by 2001 two thirds of enterprises formerly owned by the state had been privatised. He also vowed to make sure privatisation in the future happened under fairer and more tightly controlled conditions and introduced cross subsidy, whereby groups of capitalists could take over lucrative businesses for a reduced price in exchange for rejuvenating other ailing and corrupt industries. The stabilisation of the economy has therefore allowed Putin’s administration to concentrate on other important aspects such as strengthening the federal treasury. He has created seven new federal districts with strong politicians in charge of each to ensure that the concepts of federal government are upheld and that wide-scale fraud and corruption on previous scales can be tracked and brought to account easily This leads us to another area of contrast in the two presidencies: how did Yeltsin and Putin deal with the Russian oligarchs? Quite simply the rise of the oligarchs happened under the Yeltsin administrations, most notably in the loans for shares programme of 1994-95, whereby individual businessmen amassed huge personal fortunes through the gaining the control of some of Russia’s most profitable industries for little money. Notable examples of such people include Boris Berezovsky, Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Roman Abromovich. Yeltsin relied on such people to a great extent, particularly in his second period of office; indeed his election campaign was aided by the state owned broadcasting station ORT owned by Berezovsky, which actively promoted the president and ridiculed and scandalised his opponents. Such reliance on the oligarchs is easily linkable to corruption in general while Yeltsin was in office since he increasingly took advice from what became known as ‘the Philip Brown Candidate No: 020276355 BA History and Politics Second Year PL2002 family,’ a group of people close to the president who exerted a great influence on his decision-making. The ‘family’ included among others such people as Berezovsky, Abromovich, his daughter Tatyana Dyachenko, Yeltsin’s former bodyguard and even his tennis coach. These people were able to influence his policy making to their personal benefit and Berezovsky in particular was able to gain more personal political influence thanks to Yeltsin’s patronage. A telling sign perhaps is that once Putin had secured his presidency, he persuaded the Duma to pass legislation exempting Yeltsin and all members of his family from any future charges of corruption.9 Putin in turn owed much of his election to the oligarchs, especially once again to Berezovsky, however one of his election promises was to destroy the oligarchs as a class. After contradictory statements from both Berezovsky and Putin, investigations into tax evasion and fraud from Russian oligarchs began to pick up in 2000 and many of Russia’s big industrialists were ordered to pay what they owed to the Russian government, start paying taxes and to stop siphoning money abroad. In return Putin would allow them to keep their industries, as he did not desire further economic fragmentation. This is often referred to as ‘the deal.’ It is clear therefore that Putin is determined to stamp out corruption and crime in the Russian economy, but not to stamp out the oligarchs as a class simply wanting to make them pay back what they owe. This is what prompted Berezovsky to flee the country after he was wanted concerning embezzlement charges to the tune of $1 billion.10 More recently Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Russia’s richest oligarch finds himself in prison for refusing to adhere to the deal, even though he has been promised a way out of Russia and most of his personal fortune if he pays the money he owes.11 He himself believes that he has done nothing wrong, which indicates that although Putin has carried out his promises with conviction, the opposition will not give way easily. In conclusion, when contrasting the two presidencies it must be remembered that both men came to power in very different circumstances. The presidency of Yeltsin was in many ways a case of ‘wait and see,’ in the sense that although it had good intentions and potentially workable policies the climate of uncertainty prevented anything really taking shape. It was only after the crash of 1998 that the economy started to pick up and foreign policy out of necessity dictated that acquiescence with the west was needed in the early years, which 9 C. Danks, Russian Politics and Society, (Longman 2001) p.327 The Guardian Website, The Billionaire Oligarchs, October 31 2003, (cited November 9 2003) available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,3604,1074711,00.html 11 The Observer Business Section, Khodorkovsky pays the Price for reneging on ‘the deal.’ November 2 2003, (cited November 9 2003) available at: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,6903,1075713,00.html 10 Philip Brown Candidate No: 020276355 BA History and Politics Second Year PL2002 potentially damaged Russia’s relations with the new republics. A new direction in foreign policy from 1996, which shifted the focus away from the West and the US towards the CIS was continued in form by Putin along with his desire to see Russia become the strong state that he believes it will always be. Putin’s economic policy has continued to see GDP grow and his imposition of the seven federal regions has further tightened his control over domestic fiscal policy and the federal treasury making corruption less tolerable. One significant contrast between the two presidencies is one of reliance. Yeltsin had to very much rely on the oligarchs and big businesses that kept him in power after the 1996 election and some felt the same would have to be said about Putin. However his tough policy on crime and corruption has not allowed this to happen and in Putin, Russian people see a man that they believe can successfully lead them. It is fair to say that Putin inherited a Russia where its people had become slightly estranged with democracy and in their leader they saw an ageing man of ill health and who frequently acted very bizarrely on the wrong occasions. Putin may be the right man for Russia but only time will tell. The elections next year will determine Putin’s future and a second administration will see the result of his so far successful policies. This may well prove to be an even greater contrast than the one we have already. Philip Brown Candidate No: 020276355 BA History and Politics Second Year PL2002 Bibliography BBC News Website, Russia Timeline, November 4 2003, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/country_profiles/1113655.stm C. Danks, Russian Politics and Society, Longman, 2001, London The Guardian Website, The Billionaire Oligarchs, October 31 2003, http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,3604,1074711,00.html E. Huskey, Presidential Power in Russia, (Sharpe, 1999, London The Observer Business Section, Khodorkovsky pays the Price for reneging on ‘the deal.’ November 2 2003, http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,6903,1075713,00.html T. F. Remington, Politics in Russia, Longman, 1999, London RFE-RL Newsline Website http://www.rferl.org/newsline/ Russian and East European Studies (REES) Website, http://www.ucis.pitt.edu/reesweb/ R. Sawka, Russian Politics and Society Third Edition, Routledge, 2002, London S. White, A. Pravda & Z. Gitelman, Developments in Russian Politics Fifth edition, Palgrave, 2001, London S. White, Russia’s New Politics, CUP, 2000, Cambridge