"The Year of Russia" in China marks a new phase of China-Russia
relations. It will also exhibit to the Chinese public how Russia
has managed to emerge from the abyss of decline in the wake of the
Soviet Union's disintegration and embark on the road of
revival.?
Russia has been on a trajectory of curing old maladies, chaos,
order and then revival ever since the Soviet Union's disintegration
in 1991.
During Boris Yeltsin's presidential terms, Russia underwent
sharp fluctuations economic cave-in, political tumult, Chechen
chaos, NATO's eastward expansion and so on.
Credit should be given to Yeltsin for his reform measures.
Different political forces began to work together under the
parliamentarian institution, which is based on multi-ownership
market economy and multi-party infrastructure, seeking social
stability and ethnic unity. Goodwill diplomacy was pushed in an
all-round way. All this explains why major social turmoil was
prevented.
In the latter part of the Yeltsin presidency, the country
rediscovered where the vital interests of Russia lie, through
learning historical lessons and summing up experiences. As a
result, Russia's major domestic and foreign policies were
overhauled, total privatization and "shock therapy" being brought
to a halt, hostility towards the Russian Communist Party being
ended and the diplomacy shifted from leaning exclusively towards
the West to an all-round approaches.
It was against this backdrop that Vladimir Putin took the helm
at the Kremlin in 2000 and has since shaped major policies to run
the country, the road for development, the political lines and
administrative means, all stamped with his own hallmark.
His domestic policies boil down to the following: Putting the
national interests at the core, making economic revival the top
priority, installing national spirit as a driving power,
instituting powerful political mechanisms as the nation's political
basis, engaging other political parties in conditional
co-operation, using historical lessons as a mirror, taking into
full account Russia's specific situations in charting the
development road, creating a favorable international climate for
the country and trying to reinstate Russia as a first-class world
power.
Putin's road for development can be roughly summed up as
maintaining political stability, keeping the Russian version of
democracy in place to ensure social harmony, going in for a market
economy that takes care of both efficiency and social justice and
implementing all-round diplomacy geared to maintaining global and
regional balance.
His political line can be defined as taking the so-called "third
road," namely tilting neither left nor right. Backtracking to the
Soviet mode is a blind alley, while indiscriminate copying of the
Western model was not working out.
President Putin does not rave about ideology openly, but he
cares about it deeply. He absorbs useful elements from the three
ideologies popular in Russia today liberalism, socialism and
nationalism and applies them to the Russian reality selectively,
with liberalist principles more employed in economy, socialism in
politics and nationalism more assertive in Russia's foreign
policy.
?
All this explains why the president enjoys a high level of
favorability among Russians.
The economy constitutes the base of a nation's comprehensive
strength. In promoting the Russian economy, Putin resorts chiefly
to economic leverage.
First, he has put a strong brake on the privatization process,
which ran wild immediately after the Soviet Union's disintegration.
He stood up against the financial and oil oligarchs in a bid to
regain control of the nation's economic lifeline, reducing private
capital's excessive interference in Russian political affairs.
Second, he is trying to bring Russia's advantages in energy
resources into full play. The output value churned out by the
energy sector makes up 30 percent of Russia's total industrial
output value, bringing the Russian Government about 54 percent of
its annual revenue and 45 percent of its total foreign exchange
income. Russian energy resources not only have a significant
influence on the world market but also win the country
geo-political advantages.
Third, Russia has invested heavily in high-tech industries,
aiming at boosting the country's competitiveness and building up a
powerful economic entity with potential for long-term growth.
Fourth, the Russian Government is doing its best to propel the
general consumption demand on the basis of improving Russian
people's livelihoods. When ordinary people share the economic
progress, social contradictions are automatically relieved. In
recent years purchasing power has increased significantly,
evidenced, for example, by the 120 million mobile phones owned by
the 140 million Russian people.
President Putin sticks to the principle that national interests
override everything else. This is mirrored in Russia's diplomacy of
independence.
In the face of accelerating globalization and bearing the brunt
of the United States' unilateralism, Russia is in a disadvantaged
position. As a result, its diplomacy shows obvious tendency towards
seeking compromise. But one can still sense toughness on
occasion.
Russian diplomacy is rooted in helping implement the national
development strategy. First, it is pragmatic in nature in view that
the country's strength remains rather weak compared with Western
powers. At the same time, however, it is emphasized that Russia's
international prestige depends to a large degree on how effectively
its diplomatic resources are used.
Balance is another prominent feature of the Russian diplomacy.
With three quarters of its territory in Asia but its political and
cultural center in Europe, Russia enjoys space for diplomatic
maneuvers.
Russian diplomacy also prescribes refraining from confrontations
and making enemies.
Maintaining a low profile is another feature of Russian
diplomacy. What Russia wants is world-class power status, but it
never makes a loud noise about its goal.
People look at the prospects of the Russian economy with guarded
optimism. They are optimistic because Russia enjoys political
stability now, the approaches for development are right, the
potential is great and people share roughly the same aspirations.
However, optimism remains guarded because a host of problems need
to be addressed.
First and foremost is the Chechen chaos, which has been
festering for years. Then there is corruption and social
polarization. Also, economic structure rearrangement poses a thorny
problem, with heavy industry ratio being still disproportionately
large, agriculture lagging far behind and resources sectors
becoming over-bloated. The country's over-dependence on energy
industry could backfire and give rise to barriers checking economic
development in the future.
In view of this, there is still a long way to go for Russian to
claim the status of a world-class big power.
Fortunately, China-Russia relations have embarked on a healthy
road, and an optimum mode for taking the interests of both
countries into fullest consideration has been crafted.
(China Daily March 22, 2006)
