>Johnson's Russia List
>#2316
>20 August 1998
>[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>#3
>The Nation
>September 1, 1998
>Why Call It Reform?
>By Stephen F. Cohen
>Stephen F. Cohen is a professor of Russian studies and history at New
>York University. His most recent book, Rethinking Russia, will be
>published next year by Oxford.
>
>As Russia’s economic collapse spirals out of control, rarely if ever has
>American discourse about that country been so uncaringly and dangerously
>in conflict with reality. With its endless ideological mantra of a
>purported “transition from Communism to free-market capitalism,” almost
>all US government, media and academic commentary on Russia’s current
>troubles is premised on two profoundly wrong assumptions: that the
>problem is essentially a “financial crisis” and that the remedy is
>faster and more resolute application of the “reform” policies pursued by
>President Boris Yeltsin since 1991.
There is a third assumption that Mr. Cohen does not mention. This is that
the Russian government is actually in control of the Russian economy. When
I was in Moscow on a study tour a couple of years ago I attended a lecture
by Vladimir I. Markov (Ph.D., economics), Deputy Director, Russian Academy
of Sciences, Institute for Socio-economic Studies of Population, who
suggested that fully 60% of the existing private companies are in some way
or another associated with the criminal world - either they are part of this
world themselves or they make payments to it for their survival. This
situation has probably not improved since then.
As well, the difficulties that the Russian government has had in collecting
taxes are well documented. The interests of private companies may be better
served by paying protection money than by paying taxes.
In another lecture, by Boris Erasov Ph.D., Professor of Social and Cultural
Studies, Institute of Oriental Studies, Academy of Sciences, argued that
without a strong state at the top - without a powerful central authority -
Russia was likely to revert to tribalism internally, and to be under threat
from foreign powers. He suggested that, unlike the west, Russia has lacked
the institutions which have melded a variety of minorities into common
nationhood. He maintained that there is no Russian nation. Lift off the
central authority (as at present), and there is a general reversion to
tribalism (also as at present). This is essentially what was behind the
Chechnya war, where the Russians were trying to re-impose central authority
before tribalism got completely out of hand.
Ed Weick
