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Politics in Russia: power, lobby, conflicts. Issue No (49) 790

November 30 - December 06, 2009

Main tendencies of political week

Vladimir Putin’s live call-in session that enabled the PM to continue a dialogue between state authorities and the population became the central event last week. This feedback channel is one of the most popular. Stability of this format (it has existed for almost 10 years) and the date of the event were aimed at highlighting permanence and succession of the current authorities compared to the previous period.

Despite many concrete problems discussed, in his conversation with people Vladimir Putin also touched upon general issues of the country’s social and political development. Firstly, he singled out the success of authorities in maintaining positive sentiments among the population, which has quite real consequences. In particular, due to the collapse of positive expectations following the 1998 crisis the birth rate dropped sharply then, while this time demographic parameters even went up slightly. Secondly, the premier again confirmed that his visit to Pikalevo was not a precedent but a lesson of anti-crisis management for governments of all levels. It is also symbolic that live questions were asked from problem regions, which substantially neutralized accusations by the opposition claiming on the eve of the event that state authorities wanted to varnish the reality. Finally, responding to some question the premier focused on state authorities’ discipline and warned the bureaucracy against sabotaging implementation of decisions made.

The mass media covered the consequences of a terrorist attack at Nevsky Express. This campaign developed in two main directions. According to the first one, “state authorities are lying” and that was not a terrorist attack. According to the other, state authorities are helpless and the country is facing a collapse (at first infrastructural and then a state and political one). Nevertheless, the terrorist attack promoted consolidation of the population around authorities. In particular, the rating of confidence in the president and the premier jumped 10% and Dmitry Medvedev’s presidential rating advanced 5%.

Debates about peculiarities of Russian Conservatism started. UR tried to correct its mistake made during preparations for its latest congress (poorly finalized doctrine) and to neutralize a wave of criticism it was subjected to after the party declared Russian Conservatism would be its ideology, which allegedly was incompatible with modernization objectives. Presenting a new project intellectuals and functionaries focused on positive western practices, while such experience can be found also in oriental countries and in the domestic history.

Major events November 30 - December 06, 2009

Event Winning side Defeated side Development Outlooks

Vladimir Putin’s live Q&A session

Vladimir Putin

Mikhail Khodorkovsky

State authorities will keep actively using channels of feedback from the population

Dmitry Medvedev and Vladimir Putin say they will decide who will run for president closer to 2012

   

Speculations on this topic in the Russian media will stop but continue in the foreign mass media

United Russia presents the “World Experience in Conservative Modernization” project

UR

 

Debates about peculiarities of Russian Conservatism will accelerate

Many people die in an incident in Perm

   

Attempts of the opposition to accuse state authorities of incompetence and helplessness will get a new impulse

Constitutional Court judge Anatoly Kononov tenders his resignation

Valery Zorkin

Vladimir Yaroslavtsev

Judge Vladimir Yaroslavtsev may become the next retiree

Elena Leonenko is appointed deputy head of the Investigation Committee

Dmitry Medvedev

Alexander Bastrykin

Bastrykin’s dismissal is unlikely in the near future

Vladimir Filippov, chief of the quartering service of the defense ministry, is dismissed

Dmitry Medvedev

Anatoly Serdyukov

The dismissal will allow to somewhat decrease the discontent among officers with the unsolved housing problem

Changes in the government regulations allowing the PM to independently decide on establishment of emergency commissions and working groups

Vladimir Putin

 

The changes have fixed de jure the actual state of things and this won’t result in redistribution of the administrative resource in the government

Tatiana Dyachenko’s interview with the Medved magazine

   

Representatives of the “old elite” will accelerate their attempts to get included into the current agenda

Volume: 14 pages


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Other issues:
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Analytical series “The Political compass”:

Political power in Russia after presidential election
State Corporations in the Russian Economy
Political Results of 2007: Russia on the Eve of Power Shuffle
Political Landscape Ahead of the Parliamentary Election 2007
«Centers of influence» in the Russian politics
Leading Russian corporations and the executive power: interaction methods
Forecast of political developments after the presidential election in 2008

All reports for: 2009 , 2008 , 2007

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