There is, of course, lots of reaction to this news already. The Russian stock market has surged - Gazprom, where Medvedev is Chairman of the Board, is up 3% - and I have to say that in the imperfect world of Russian politics a smooth transition to a Medvedev administration may be the best possible outcome for anyone concerned about continued growth and stability in Russia. Medvedev's involvement in corporate Russia predates his involvement with Gazprom - he was head of legal affairs at SPB-based timbercompany Ilim Pulp for most of the 1990s - and fits with his the "moderate liberal / technocrat" label generally applied to Medvedev's politics.
The market's favorable reaction to this news may also reflect a sense of relief that the succession process is moving forward. There have been a lot of rumblings about unseemly "under-the-carpet" battles taking place among top officials lately (with baffling and disturbing public manifestations like the affair surrounding the Shvartsman interview, and the arrest of Storchak), and perhaps having a successor-designate in place reduces the sense that Putin's departure is leaving a huge vacuum.
Who will be leading the way after March?
[image source]
[image source]
Looking ahead, this may also be good news for the future of the US-Russian relationship, both because making money is one thing both countries agree on and because of who Medvedev is not - a hawk like Sergei Ivanov. But who knows - the past few months have been all about surprises and the expectation of more surprises, so this apparent outcome (an anointed successor from among the two candidates who have been in play for at least a year now), because it's one which might have been expected six months ago, is in itself a bit of a surprise.
On the other hand, there's still plenty of time for more twists and turns as the "2008 question" works its way to a resolution. And perhaps Medvedev in the Kremlin would be ideal - young and easily packaged for voters, palatable to big business and to the outside world, and apparently very manageable. According to Limonov (not that he's an unbiased, or even sane, source):
It is well known that within Putin's entourage Medvedev is called "son," apparently, because of his obedience to Putin. The fact that he has practically been appointed president means the continuation of chekist-oligarchic rule in Russia.From the Moscow Times profile of Medvedev, titled "A Soft-Spoken, 'Smart Kid' Lawyer":
None of Dmitry Medvedev's friends can remember hearing him bark an order. If he ever did, it would sound forced, they said.Soft-spoken and a full 10 centimeters shorter than the diminutive President Vladimir Putin, Medvedev is a far cry from what the public expects in a leader, political consultants said.
Lenta.ru recalls the shifting fortunes of Medvedev and Ivanov over the course of 2006 and 2007 in this commentary - perhaps we shouldn't be to quick to pronounce Medvedev the successor, since he already looked to have it in the bag in 2006, only to seem surpassed byIvanov earlier this year. But time is running out another twist of fortune. From the Lenta piece, which is titled, simply, "The Successor" (my translation):
Observers by now were expecting all sorts of surprises. Few believed any longer that the successor would be from the group of long-discussed candidates. Some thought that Zubkov would become a "technical" president, who would stay in office for a year or two and then resign so that Putin could once again head the government. But as it turned out a different scenario has played out. [...]The New Times asks, "Who is Mr Medvedeff?" in an article which headlines his intelligentsia background and traces his rise to power in 1990s St. Petersburg and later in the Putin administration (my translation):
If nothing extraordinary happens, Medvedev's victory in the presidential elections is, of course, guaranteed. Experts agree that this would mean the very continuation of the course of Russia's development that Putin and the members of United Russia have been talking about so much. Gryzlov called Medvedev the "most socially oriented" of the potential candidates, and United Russia representatives had earlier said on multiple occasions that in the Fifth Duma they plan to focus on social issues. Economic analysts call Medvedev a liberal, which, in theory, should be appealing to Western investors.
According to many accounts, during those years [the early '90s] people often thought Medvedev was Putin's personal secretary and did not take him seriously. According to Stanislav Belkovsky, "Dmitry Anatol'evich, who is pliant, soft, and psychologically dependent, was psychologically always absolutely comfortable for Vladimir Vladimirovich, and for [Putin] that is extremely important." [...]New Times then talks a bit about how Igor Sechin and his allies in the administration worked against Medvedev, but that part of the story is not very well developed. No doubt there will be copious speculative accounts about how this is a "victory" for this or that faction of the Kremlin elites.
Medvedev's new life begain in November 1999, when he became the deputy head of the government administration while Putin was Prime Minister. Immediately following Boris Yeltsin's historic speech and his "abdication of the throne," Medvedev became the deputy head of the Presidential Administration, with the idea that he would later replace Aleksandr Voloshin. Voloshin and Roman Abramovich, according to Stanislav Belkovsky, proposed Medvedev for the job, and when Voloshin was stepping down three years later as head of the administration (in large part in protest over the Yukos case), he insisted that he be replaced by Medvedev (who also talked about the authorities' actions in the Yukos case as "not thought all the way through").
Putin himself has admitted that he planned to make Medvedev head of the Federal Securities Commission (according to some accounts, he wanted to have Dmitry Kozak head up the administration). If that had happened, Dmitry Anatol'evich could have gotten his hands on some "real" work, like his friend and partner Anton Ivanov did. It's no accident that Medvedev resembles a young top manager or financial director... And then today there wouldn't be the official Medvedev, there would be Medvedeff, the head of a division of some large Western investment bank. And he would have parted ways with Putin once and for all, not counting Christmas cards sent from Moscow to London and from London to Moscow.
But Putin needed a reliable person in the Kremlin, moreover Medvedev did not irritate the Yeltsin-era elite either. That's how the idea emerged to make him the president's heir: Medvedev was chosen as a compromise and practically ideal figure, acceptable to everyone. By many accounts, the idea took shape in the fall of 2005. By November of 2005, Medvedev was appointed first deputy Prime Minister, and in the spring of 2006 he was supposed to become Prime Minister. However every action, as is well known, leads to an equal and opposite reaction.
Other internet resources about the apparent heir-apparent (I like that phrase, can you tell?):
Vladimir Pribylovsky's Anticompromat has a thorough bio and a clippings file. Just yesterday, Pribylovsky had speculated that Valentina Matviyenko might be the designated successor.
Robert Amsterdam has posted excerpts from Medvedev's "most official 'keynote' address."
NewsRu.com has an interesting agglomeration of stories about Medvedev, including his comments on the use of "olbansky" (a corrupted version of Russian used on the internet) and his affinity for Deep Purple. It also cites a fresh joke from the website Dirty.ru, which also has this picture of a stunned Medvedev:
Indeed, the news did not take long to make it on to the Kremlin's website (which, interestingly, does not seem to have a text of Putin's scathingly anti-Western Luzhniki speech) and United Russia's website (which does have the Luzhniki speech), with both accounts including Putin's comment:
As far as the candidacy of Dmitry Anatol'evich Medvedev, I can say that I have known him for more than 17 years, we have worked very closely together for all of those years, and I wholly and entirely support this choice.
*Believe it or not, I wrote this Godfather reference before seeing Sean's similar reference in his post about the anointing of Medvedev - I guess it's not a surprising reference, given the context.
**Upd 20 minutes later - This story seems to be generating unoriginal thoughts - I just saw that Mr. Shedd, the Accidental Russophile, beat me to the punch in using the "Preved, Medved" headline in his post about the news, although I think we were both beaten by hundreds or thousands of Russian bloggers. Sorry to step on your toes, Wally! By the way, in case there's anyone on the internets who still doesn't know the "Preved" story, Wikipedia seems to have it covered.
***Upd another 30 minutes later (clearly poking around on the internet in the guise of "following a breaking story" is more fun than studying for exams) - I had forgotten about this story, but maybe Medvedev's designation means that Putin has worked out a way to stay in power, and it will be as the head of a new Russia-Belarus Union, which could be announced while Putin is in Belarus this week. That is just one of the versii put forward in Reuters' speculative "fact box" about what job(s) Putin might find for himself once he has removed the monomakh's hat of the presidency.
Actually, regardless of the details, if the announcement Medvedev as successor turns out to be the last word, and Dmitry Anatol'evich takes the Kremlin in the first round of elections, it's pretty likely that today's announcement was the consequence of some deal finally being struck - just like big-time politics anywhere else, right?
Also, I can't not post this reaction to the news, apparently created back in 2006, the last time that Medvedev was heir apparent:
15 comments:
No problem with the Preved, Medved. My girl Elena Skochilo in Bishkek was the first to utter the phrase to me today (in the context of Medvedev).
Besides, you wrote much more and your images are much cooler than the one I lifted from Kommersant!
Don't you have exams?!?
I really don't think the Russia-Belarus Union is plausible - Peskov has already said it's not true...if Putin opens a magazin in Ulan-Ude, they will still claim he is running the country
Jesse, I do have exams, and saying that they're not until the 18th and the 21st is getting less and less reassuring with each passing day, especially since there's still a paper I have to finish in there somewhere. But don't forget that I'm a 3L, so panic and motivation are harder to come by this year than in the past. And even in December of my 1L year I have vivid memories of avoiding Civ Pro and Contracts studying to write a few posts.
I was more diligent - or perhaps just exhausted from interviews and 17 credits - last fall, but last spring (2L spring), I blogged up a storm in April and May (not to mention insane comment battles at Sean's Russia Blog) and somehow still didn't fail anything. If I wasn't doing this, I'd be procrastinating in some other way. I'm not proud of that, but there it is.
Back to the lecture at hand, I sort of agree with you - although the Russia-Belarus union may yet come about, the versiia of Putin getting it set up on an accelerated basis and taking over in the next few months is one that I'd say has like a 5% chance of coming about.
Oh, and the reason people will still claim Putin is running the country no matter what he does (almost) is that he has himself proclaimed his intent to be involved in the country's political life and has very recently held a "referendum" on his leadership which he resoundingly won. Plus, a number of organizations which take their cues either from Putin or from people very close to him have begged him to stay. So while there are definitely people who have long overstated Putin's desire and ability to stick around at the top (though I think it's clear that if he had wanted to remain at all costs, he could have done so - and could still do so! - at the cost of appearing to go back on his word and of eroding any pretense of democratic institutions - and kudos to him if he really does leave), many of whom will overstate whatever influence he has starting next March (or May, whenever he officially leaves office), they don't exactly have to make things up to be convincing.
Things will get interesting when he leaves, depending on where he goes (but don't you think he'll wind up with some fairly influential post, even if Medvedev turns out to be a "real" President and not a "technical" one?), because it is almost inevitable that when things go wrong (and they will, no boom lasts forever), one of two things will happen: Medvedev (or others who want to lay Putin to rest) will blame Putin and try to undermine his residual authority; or Putin (or others who want Putin back) will blame Medvedev and undermine his existing authority. I guess a third option is possible - they could both stand together and blame "the West" and all of the foreign-embassy-lovers inside of Russia, but the elite seems a bit more fractious than that, and it might be hard to credibly blame the same old enemies if the problem is something like growing inflation or (on the other end of the spectrum) an unexpected drop in oil prices.
By the way, are there any Russo-lawyer gatherings coming up in DC that I should be aware of?
Oh, and since I probably shouldn't do another post on this, here are a couple of RIAN stories on Medvedev:
This one plays up Medvedev the Westernizer ("Putin's support of First Deputy Prime Minister Medvedev has been received as the president's signal that Russia will stick to its free market aspirations and seek close ties with the West.") and has a number of quotes of "pleasant surprise" from Western analysts. I have to say that I share the pleasant surprise and hope that Medvedev can do without Putin's inostrantsy-bashing rhetoric.
And this one talks about Medvedev's long past with Putin, highlighting in the lede that he "is regarded as one of the people closest to President Vladimir Putin and, at the same time, has no close connection with the so-called siloviki, top military and secret service officers."
I just realized that if you take Medvedev's initials and put them in ФИО order (like people used to do, expressively, with ЕБН), you get something even more expressive - МДА. Мда.
And one last quality (I thought) post-mortem on the elections.
Lyndon,
Probably no Russo-lawyer gatherings this semester, though definitely at the beginning of the next...a fellow Russophile and I will get together thursday night after my last final at RFD in Chinatown...email me if you want to come.
Ever since the idea of Putin as PM was floated, I have liked that idea. But now that Medvedev is apparently the next president, I really think a 'real' Medvedev presidency would be great for Russia and US-Russian relations. Putin is most concerned about continuity of policy - where the naysayers go wrong is in suggesting that he is solely concerned with continuity of his own personal power. I really think he will step down for reals now, and merely serve as an 'otets' advisor to Medvedev. Finally, I am, and I sense you are too, excited about the prospect of a Medvedev presidency - a young modern liberal lawyer. He is the face of the new post-cold war Russia (i.e., never ran a collective farm, never served in the security services). The fact that he is so young represents sort of a 'rebirth' for Russia. I like it.
Finally, I thought maybe they chose him for the excellent campaign propaganda his name allows for, considering UR's mascot - 'Medvedi dlya Medvedeva' -it has a ring to it.
I think a "real" president is mutually exclusive with Putin being PM or even Duma speaker, unless he's prepared to be some kind of stealth PM. There would be inevitable tension, some of which would be fed by bystanders with something to gain (within the entourage and from the opposition alike).
I think where the "naysayers" have a point is that, regardless of what Putin wants, there are very powerful people right beside Putin, people with influence and resources, who are concerned about the continuity of their own personal power / cash flow. So that dimension is certainly not absent from the "succession question," and an important thing to watch in the mid-2008 months - assuming Medvedev takes over - will be which of the siloviki stick around in prominent positions. Probably the deal (and hopefully there is a deal and it's honored by all, otherwise we may be treated to an object lesson in how unstable the ruling structure of this "stable" country really is) is that they all stick around.
As for Putin himself, although what he wants seems inscrutable (and we'll never know if he really has "privatized" $41bn as alleged by Belkovsky), I'm happy to acknowledge that it may well be nothing more than continuity of policy. On the other hand, it seems that Putin's most successful "policy" - especially if one considers his second term - has been the high price of oil. How exactly can anyone pledge to continue that "policy"?
All of that said, you are right, I am cautiously optimistic about the idea of President Medvedev - cautiously because in the 1990s Russia showed how thoroughly it is able to disappoint optimists. Also, one of the reasons his independence as President is hard to imagine is precisely that he is not a Chekist, although of course he is a Gazprom guy. I wonder whether he will step down as Chairman during the campaign, after he's elected, or never?
Something I had been pondering earlier was the extent to which Medvedev may be a classic "new Russian" - prosperous in a corporate job but politically connected throughout the '90s, apolitical other than being an economic liberal (though I haven't read his press in detail to try to glean insights, and there was his anti-xenophobia speech a while back), well-to-do but retaining odd (to the Western eye, or rather ear - except for LedZep, anyway) musical tastes that do after all reflect the closed media environment he grew up in. Probably one shouldn't read too much into musical tastes, though.
Another thing that I thought of when I read your last comment is that, while Medvedev may be indeed be an appealing face of post-Cold-War Russia, who will he be dealing with (or getting written about by) in the West? Unfortunately, too many people who have retained a cold-war mentality. So it may be a mode of interaction that we still can't escape. A "rebirth" of Kremlinologists is difficult when the new generation is of necessity trained by those who remember the bad old days all too well. Plus I have little doubt that the people from Putin's team - like Lavrov and S. Ivanov, assumiung they stick around - will continue to beat on the West rhetorically, so even if Medvedev is reaching out with open gas valves, it may be hard to feel the warmth. All in all, no matter what happens, interesting times are ahead, though that always seems to be the case in our favorite part of the world.
While the high price of oil has of course been an important factor, I would also point to the dramatic rise in FDI(not limited to the energy sector) that has resulted from good economic policy - the flat tax, restrained government spending, and a freely convertible ruble. The point is that if and when the price of oil does fall, Russia's economic fundamentals will be 'sound' and there will be no collapse like there was [twice] in the nineties.
The most vexing question for me is this - if Russia does develop into a 'normal' European country, will it still interest me?
Most of those policies you mentioned were products of the first term. And I would venture to say that one of the most popular things Putin has done is increase certain forms of social spending (pensions, salaries for state employees and soldiers, etc.), which I don't think he would have been able to do to the extent he has if not for the oil windfall.
And the single most popular thing about Putin (if I can be permitted to climb inside the head of the collective Russian electorate), i.e., the fact that "Russia is strong again," "s nami schitaiutsia," etc., is almost entirely due to the energy leverage, which Putin, to be sure, has used masterfully. Remember that during the first term the subject of Putin's planovye 5-10 minutes leading Vremia and Vesti every night was often his meetings with foreign leaders - the image of an active, delovoi president in those years was presented as someone who met with lots of foreigners and was restoring respect for Russia almost simply by being capable of doing so (in contrast to Yeltsin).
So the first-term imagery involved the West just as much as the second-term imagery did - what it was missing was the petrodollar-induced swagger. I'm oversimplifying things, of course, but hopefully you agree that I have at least a bit of a point.
It will be interesting to see how things unfold if the scenario ends up as it now appears it will - President Medvedev and PM Putin. Because such a setup would allow Putin to continue to whip up paranoia among domestic audiences about "orange revolutions" and Western enemies while Medvedev goes to the G-8 events and (hopefully) becomes friendly with (hopefully) Obama, or whoever the new US Prez is. This is good because it will give American Russophobes less fodder (domestic West-bashing is much less covered in the news here than things like Munich or Putin's several other hostile or insulting statements this year); but also bad, because the cancer of the imagined "external enemy" will be able to continue to spread.
This is the single most important line:
Soft-spoken and a full 10 centimeters
shorter than the diminutive President Vladimir Putin, Medvedev is a far cry from what the public expects in a leader, political consultants said.
And that's why he's just what Putin wants. No kind of threat.
Yeah. Putin only supports people physically smaller than he is that he could beat in a fight.
How is Putin "diminutive?" He's 5'7"!
He's 5'7"!
No, he isn't.
This random person on the internet says Putin is 170cm tall, or 5'8", and notes the downward trend from Yeltsin (189cm/6'3"-6'4") to Putin (170/5'8") to Medvedev (162/5'5"). But here's an extensive discussion/debate on the topic of Putin's height (the things people talk about at length on the internet :-) ).
On Medvedev, I don't have reliable info, but I've seen other claims on the web that he is 158cm - or even 156cm - tall. That would be 5'2"-5'3".
This random person on the internet says Putin is 170cm tall, or 5'8"...
170cm is actually 5'7". Putin is more like 5'5"-5'6".
db, right you are. I was operating on the assumption that inches = cm / 2.5, but I guess the proper factor is more like 2.54.
I guess that means Medvedev really is a short guy - closer to 5'4" based on the largest guess I've seen. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
"I guess that means Medvedev really is a short guy - closer to 5'4" based on the largest guess I've seen. Not that there's anything wrong with that."
Lyndon, of course there is something wrong with it! Are you too young to know Randy Newman's "Short People"?
Here it is, "Short People":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3OTM9KBOFQ
I know Medvedev likes Deep Purple and Black Sabbath, but perhaps he should invite Randy Newman to sing this song during his inagural (but maybe I'm jumping too way ahead--stuff happens.)
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