Ever since the fall of the Soviet Union in the 1990’s, relations between the West and the Russian Federation, successor to the Soviet state, have improved when compared to their parlous condition during the era known as the Cold War. Recently, however, Russia under Vladimir Putin has shifted its stance in an eastward facing direction, proclaiming that Russia’s future lay with the People’s Republic of China and the booming economies of East Asia.
Rather than invest in rapprochement with the West, whose values are inimical to Russia and, according to Putin, present a threat to Russia’s rise to its former glory, Russia has sheltered American defector Edward Snowden, criticized western governments with regard to Syria, and passed anti-homosexual legislation that marks it as one of the more dogmatic nations in opposition to what many nations in western Europe support as basic human rights.
In many respects pragmatic, and in many ways delusional, Vladimir Putin’s declaration of affection for the PRC merely continues the schizophrenic history that Russia and, before it, the Soviet Union have maintained with what should be a natural ally. As to whether these statement mark the beginnings of actual cooperation or are merely part of the chaotic undulation of Russian affections in the region is a story that only time can tell. Yet reading too much into Putin’s gestures would be a mistake, at least in this author’s humble opinion.
Rather what we are witnessing now is a Russian Federation rendered increasingly irrelevant by its stagnant national growth, whether it is the population problem (too many deaths, not enough babies) or its attempts at forging regional hegemony, Russia is mired in a past that is unworkable and finds itself in a position that is untenable. Wealth in the Russian Federation is controlled by oligarchs who derive their riches from primary industries like mining and oil. Unlike the wealthy in more advanced economies in the world, Russian wealth is notable for its lack of diversification and its extreme gap between the richest in its society and its poorest. Indeed, the Russian economy is heavily dependent on primary industrial activity to the extent that tethering itself to a large, booming economy like China’s, which is relatively resource poor, is not only pragmatic but follows logically if one is a student of economic theory.
In other words, when the money is gone in China, who knows where Russia’s affections will lie then? By that time, who knows who will lead Russia?
For all its negative press these days Russia still has a golden opportunity to transform itself into a leading nation on many fronts. Armed with an educated populace and some of the best computer programmers in the world, the Russian Federation could become a leader in all sorts of areas if wealth diversification, political openness, and the rule of law prevailed. Some call it a “kleptocracy,” a state in which whatever one gains through economic effort can be taken and appropriated by the state, given to someone else, or any such manner of arbitrary disrespect for the basic rules of private property that many citizens in advanced economies enjoy. With its confused set of agendas Russia is not a nation to be feared for any reason other than its baffling lack of coherent direction at this time which is, at the end of the day, a greater threat to world stability than any amount of posturing.