The First Colloquium
The New Jerusalem Monastery, Istra, Russia
Opening Session2
Dr. Billington3 welcomed participants to the colloquium on the future of Russian national identity in the 21st century. He gave a brief history of this project, funded by the Carnegie Corporation, and mentioned the recently-completed three-part television series The Face of Russia-and the book he wrote to accompany it-which is scheduled to be shown on public broadcasting stations in the United States beginning June 17. After two seminars held at the Library of Congress in October 1996 and March 1997, it was decided that the next step would be a small colloquium in Russia that would allow for a deep discussion of this topic with Russians. The final report of these talks could help Western observers better understand Russia's effort to develop a post-Soviet national identity and legitimacy. After explaining the basic format-concrete questions the first day and a more general exploration of the topic the second day-Dr. Billington introduced the American Ambassador.
Ambassador Jim Collins has graciously agreed to join us and make some opening remarks. Ambassador Collins was sworn in as Ambassador to the Russian Federation on September 2, 1997. A career diplomat with extensive experience in Russian affairs, Ambassador Collins returned to Moscow for the fourth time following a Washington assignment as Senior Coordinator and then Ambassador-at-large and Special Advisor to the Secretary of State for the Newly Independent States. Mr. Collins twice before served at the American Embassy in Moscow: from 1990-1993 as deputy Chief of Mission and Chargé d'Affaires and from 1973 to 1975 as Second Secretary. Academic study and research brought Ambassador Collins to Moscow for the first time from 1965-1966 as an exchange fellow at the History Faculty of Moscow University.
I think that most of you know Ambassador Collins and appreciate his dedication to strengthening Russian-American ties and understanding. I have known him for nearly 40 years, since he was a student in my Russian history course in 1959. And I had the privilege to see his outstanding performance during the fateful days in August 1991 when he was in charge of the American Embassy.
Ambassador Collins said that he was pleased to join the group for the morning session and honored to work with Russians at a time of a revolution that was transforming all aspects of life.
The changes have been going on for ten years already, but this is still the first stage and it is interesting to consider how the population will react to the alteration of everyday life, and where all these changes might lead. This revolution and these changes are taking place in a world that is quite different from the world of the past century and the time of the last revolution. Now the international context in which changes are taking place is even more important than earlier. This colloquium is an example of the kind of inside-outside view of the process of change in Russia, which includes the all-important increased use of computers and the Internet. The United States supports the policy of open ties between our governments, as well as between our citizens, and a close working relationship with Russia as an evolving civil society. And as habits of openness take hold, one can see how Russians at all levels of society are linking up with counterparts in other societies. The Colloquium on Russian National Identity is a striking example of this phenomenon.
Session 1: Russia in 2020: Predictions/Hard Reality
1. What do you think Russia will be like in 2020? How will the country differ from Russia today-geographically, politically, economically, and in the area of culture-and what will the main differences be?
Aleksandr Yakovlev: It is good that this is a small group, and one can speak frankly. History is moving so fast that it's impossible to say what will happen this fall. Fascism? Some sort of crisis? This is a transitional Russia (perekhodnaia Rossiia). We don't know, for instance, whether everything will continue to be directed from Moscow, or whether the regions will be given some freedom. The term identity puts you on your guard. There clearly is a Russian national identity, which, thank God, has a future and hopefully will not move very much in the direction of universalism. But another branch exists, a kind of nationalism that can lead to fascism. We must overcome our imperial feelings (imperskoe chuvstvo). At the basis of the national idea-although I am very much against the search for such an idea-is our thousand-year-old poverty (nishcheta), which we must eliminate, and our bespravie (lack of rights, lawlessness). We have our Stenka Razin and Pugachev. . . ; it's all volia, volia, volia (elemental freedom). We must move from the condition of volia to svoboda (civic freedom, guaranteed by custom or law) before we can talk about the future. So far we have developed democratic procedures, but not svoboda in its fullest sense. I agree with Ambassador Collins on the importance of globalization. We still don't fully understand how we will live with others. Globalization will be wonderful in financial, even political, matters, but I fear the possible damage to our culture (udar po kul'ture).
Yuri Kariakin: Dostoevsky said that our weakest point is our self-consciousness. . . . As for the intelligentsia, they have been busy since the beginning of glasnost, enlightening, commenting on, and praising themselves (samoprosveshchenie, samokommentarie, samovoskhvalenie), and they developed a cynical attitude during the communist period. It's impossible to make predictions (zadacha nerazreshima). In 1990 it was hard to predict the events of 1991. . . . We're one of the richest countries in the world, at least potentially, but this rich country has become a very poor one. . . .
Viktor Aksiuchits: The Russian people is a collective organism with a collective personality and soul, and a unique historical fate. This was a Russian Orthodox civilization, an empire. The 1917 catastrophe led to an idea-driven regime (ideokratiia), a virus that could have killed the organism, but the organism survived. We went from unconsciousness (bespamiatstvo) to consciousness (samosoznanie), and just when this civilization had achieved its maturity, there was a break (izlom) and the organism began fighting for its existence. Two possible variants lie ahead: (1) a kind of "soft," "mild," authoritarianism (miagkii avtoritarizm). Problems can be solved under such a system; it would have a constitution, and by 2020 we could see a revived country (vozrozhdennaia strana); or, (2) a crueler, rougher form of authoritarianism-fascism. . . if Russia breaks down into provinces. As a regime, it would solve some problems but bring others and delay stability-we wouldn't have attained it by 2020. Then it would be an additional 20 years before we have a really stable period.
Lev Anninsky: Four hundred years ago we had a Time of Troubles (smuta) that set our consciousness for hundreds of years afterward. . . . We are now in such a period, when you have a bifurcation in important areas of life. For my generation, the break-up of the USSR was a tragedy. Geographically, the regions are distancing themselves from the center. Americans, with their memories of Texas and the South, can understand this. Economically, the center and the regions are acting separately, trying lots of different things, and individuals are playing leapfrog, moving from one job to another. Politically, a prediction of what Russia will be like twenty years from now would still be very mixed. Culture is in a critical condition, but this is not all bad. In the future there will be less of a division into things that are completely positive or completely negative. It will be Russian, in the Russian language, but more attuned to pre-Christian folk culture, more ecumenical and less completely Orthodox.
Georgy Satarov: Two very different possibilities in political, economic, and cultural areas exist: the negative variant is the most probable, given the economic and social problems, and the backlash by the left (levyi revansh), which would bring the Communist Party to power, and a reaction to that threat with a right-wing coup (pravyi perevorot) as in Spain and Chile, and a right dictatorship led by a general. Maybe a new figure from the provinces, someone we don't know yet, will appear on the scene. And there is a threat that Russia will not be preserved as an intact state and government because it is weak in a federative sense. It is a faith-based country (konfessional'naia strana), and a primitive ideology can be attractive. Of course, this is dangerous because it would be not just a large territory falling apart, but a nuclear power. These are the possible negative scenarios. Later I will talk about the positive variants that could occur.
Aleksandr Rubtsov: If there is too much negativism and bleakness (surovost') about the future, this will spread and wind up influencing that future. It's impossible to say exactly what will happen, because the world changes. We could make predictions in the past, but we can't now. This is a particular kind of prediction (osobyi rod predskazaniia), a black box.4 It's not clear what's going on inside, and in principle it's impossible to say. There may be a bifurcation, there are dangers, and it could turn out in a negative or positive way. Much depends on the spiritual state of society, on its consciousness (sostoianie dukha, soznanie obshchestva). What is important is the interrelation (vzaimootnoshenie) with reality: do we understand and correctly assess what is happening around us?
There are powerful myths, like the idea that Russia has always had a very strong central government. Everything is exaggerated, hypertrophied to the limit: we had a Party and a government (gosudarstvo). The Party left power and the government turned out not to function very well. Why would it have, since it wasn't allowed to in the past? After the Party left power, it was like having a prosthesis, there was an empty feeling. Culturally, the supposed communal spirit (obshchinnost') of society during the Soviet period masked what was actually the fragmentation of society (atomizatsiia obshchestva). . . . So what was hypertrophied and exaggerated turned out to be an empty category. This has always been an ideological country. Now we need to understand ourselves, to see reality. We need the right frame of mind (umonastroenie) and sense of moderation. The intelligentsia know what is going on and what to do, but still can't act. There are: (1) people who live worse than before and don't support change; (2) people who live better and support change; (3) people who live worse but still support change; and (4) people who live better, but feel worse-they buy a lot but they don't feel good. Ordinary ideological methods don't help here in finding out what the core values (kliuchevye tsennosti) are.
Natalia Ivanova: One reaction to the artificial enthusiasm of the early years of perestroika and its image of re-building is that the anti-utopia became popular. As a society, we're not thinking about the future right now, but what are possible scenarios? There could be a further disintegration of Russia. We found out in 1979 in Afghanistan that the USSR could not grow larger, and that led to the demise of the country (krakh SSSR). [Andrei] Amalrik, in his book Will the Soviet Union Last Until 1984?, was right: Russia is disintegrating at the edges (na kraiakh) and in places like Tatarstan. . . . Moscow is very nicely decorated, but it is gnilaia (rotten, corrupt), and it takes all the money. . . . Economically, there are difficult times ahead-even more than now-as things have become very complicated. Culturally, there has been a decline, but there could be local developments (mestnichestvo). Other scenarios are possible. . . . There is a possibility of restoring the USSR.
Nikolai Shmelev: A prognosis isn't so much a question of logic as of faith or the absence of faith. For the upheaval that began under Gorbachev, two generations are needed, a period of upheaval (konvul'sivnyi period) of forty years, to carry out and to absorb such big changes . . . maybe more than two generations, but what will we see in twenty years? Politically, we may have a modified authoritarian regime, and the country will not fall apart. Chechnya is a separate case, an insane asylum (sumasshedshii dom). The central government is weak, yet it wants all the resources while provinces are demanding more for themselves. Increased tariffs are a case of genuine stupidity (superglupost'), and it will take several years of bargaining to achieve some sort of balance. There will be three parties in twenty years: the left (Social Democrats), the right, and the nationalists. I agree with Solzhenitsyn on the importance of local self-government, which we had been developing in the second half of the 19th century. So far we have democracy just on the top and not below. A civil society (grazhdanskoe obshchestvo) will develop. Economically, what is Moscow? Luzhkov. The problems and their solutions will not depend, as they do now, on who is in power. There will be a market solution (rynochnoe reshenie) and everyone except Viktor Anpilov5 understands this. In seventy years we built an enormous industrial society, and yet much of what was built up is now completely unnecessary. At least two-thirds should either be changed radically or closed down, and we need at least twenty years to solve this. No one has a plan for the countryside, and small plots are growing a lot of the food that's available now, but this won't be solved in one or two generations. One third of the workers are not needed, but what will we give them to do? The government is making it hard for the small middle class to succeed. In twenty years, we will go from semi-paralysis to some sort of movement. Under the Bolsheviks, the government was the number one criminal, and we had a criminal system. Things will be a little easier for the next generation; there will be an instinct for self-preservation and some balance. . . . The interest in religion now is in part a reaction to all the years of repression, but some of it is not organic to Russia.
. . . We suffered a terrible genetic loss (geneticheskii ushcherb) as 60,000,000 young people, the best in the country (zolotaia molodezh') perished during the Soviet period, and it will take five generations, until 2150, for that to be made up (geneticheskoe vyzdorovlenie). Internationally, the former republics will achieve some sort of unity, some coming together (priblizhenie), after the experience of a civilized-or uncivilized-divorce. In the Caucasus, Armenia has no hope of an independent existence; for Georgia there is some hope, but the entire nation cannot live on the profits from an oil pipeline. . . . Azerbaijan is being supported by the U.S. as an oil reserve, and it will do well if there is a demand for oil.
Valerii Tishkov: Futurology is very weak methodologically and is not a serious undertaking (delo) when such radical changes are taking place. . . . In twenty years the present borders may have changed as a result of willfulness or coercion (volia, nasilie). The disintegration of the USSR was a trauma and there will be a second round of integration. Territorial questions are very important: for Russia, Sevastopol and the Crimea are more a part of national consciousness (mental'nost') than Alaska and Hawaii are part of American consciousness. The northern Caucasus may break away. . . . And there is the exclave of Kaliningrad, as well as the diaspora, but territories will not be transferred.
How will a civil society mature, and at what point can we begin to have ambitions? It won't develop from Moscow outwards. Demographically, the population is growing in the European part and in the south; Russia isn't in the worst position in Europe, and there is immigration [into Russia], but the growth won't be in the Russian regions as much as in the south, in Daghestan. But Russians will keep their majority, which now stands at 70%. It is still more prestigious to be Russian, and people who are the product of mixed marriages count themselves as Russians.
Spatially (prostranstvenno), there is a lot of empty territory near China. This is a complex state, an ethnic society without much national sense of self. Economically, there have been a lot of positive developments in recent years, a lot of construction including in the countryside, a lot of progress and choice. There are private interests which are not politically well-organized. Culturally, the intelligentsia are reading [Aleksandra] Marinina [a former police officer with a law degree, whose crime novels are best sellers], but the cultural resources are immense.
Anninsky: The foundations of the Russian mentality (russkoi mental'nosti) lie in two ideas of culture, one based on the Russian language, and the other based on Russian Orthodoxy.
Tishkov:. . . .There is russkii (ethnically and/or linguistically Russian) and rossiiskii (a citizen of the Russian state). When people come from a mixed background, why does there need to be only one identity?
Amb. Collins: In twenty years, people who are now 18-23 will be running everything. How will they want to live? What will they think? How are they preparing for their future? Knowing this will give us the most concrete possible idea of what things will be like in twenty years.
Tishkov: According to statistics, 70% of the population feel some level of xenophobia. . . . Education is still a very high priority. . . . Socially, divorces are at the same level as during the Soviet period. Religiosity is minimal and Russia is still an atheistic country. There is less alcohol abuse than before-so maybe we will be able to avoid at least one big social problem-because more people are driving cars [and the laws are strict], even though it is easier to buy alcohol than 10 years ago. . . . In twenty years youth will be more political. . . .
Billington: I'm interested in hearing more about the people who are living better than before, but feeling worse. It's really an interesting question. Is it everyone's impression that this group exists and that it is fairly large?
. . .6Tishkov: Young people are now helping to support their parents, which wasn't the case in the past. My friends complain that their kids have better jobs than they do, and the parents are nostalgic.
Amb. Collins: What can be said about the younger generation as a whole?
Kariakin: I still teach literature in high school, and I see changes each year. I feel that I am taught by my students these days.
. . . Satarov: There have been lots of surveys over the past few years, ones that ask about the population's mood during the past week. So I have recent examples of that kind of survey: 8% of the people surveyed felt very positive; 46% said that they felt calm, so more than half the population is feeling more or less okay (normal'no). Approximately 29% felt a little anxious, while about 12% admitted to being fearful, which is a drop. The number of people feeling calm (spokoistvie) is significantly higher than in 1995, for instance. In assessing current problems, 25% of the population feel that there is a moral and cultural crisis: 15% say that the main problem is in the country's further development (razvitie strany). 86% say that the world of their parents is dissolving, and 80% say that no one believes in anything these days. When asked about their faith in government and social institutions, 6% said that they had faith in the military, even fewer said they had faith in the church. . . . When asked about important ideas shaping Russian society, 5% said they looked to communism. 8% mentioned socialism, 2.5% religious ideas, 6% the idea of democracy, 4.5% the idea of Russian originality (samobytnost'), and 35% supported the idea of Russia being a major world power (velikaia derzhava). When asked about their attitudes towards political leaders throughout the CIS, no Russian leaders received even 1% support from among those polled-Zyuganov did best with 0.4%, while Lukashenka [Belarus'] and Nazarbaev [Kazakhstan] each received 20%.
Aksiuchits: This generation focuses on day-to-day concerns (zhiznennyi interes), and looks to see which leaders have similar interests. Yeltsin is seen negatively, as a bulldozer, by those being pushed out of the way. What Russians want is historical development that is not destructive (razrushitel'nyi), but constructive (sozidatel'nyi). With Chernomyrdin, there was a sense that aggression was possible, maybe a putsch. The younger generation of leaders, Nemtsov, Kirienko, do not yet play a direct role in Russian history. There are new directions and tendencies, and new rules of the game. People understand they have to look out for themselves.
. . . Rubtsov: Getting back to the question of why some people are doing well but feeling bad, it depends on who's speaking and who's listening. People can be eating a good dinner, but the conversation will include complaints about hunger [in Russia]. For so long people couldn't speak negatively in public and now we can, but we don't yet have the words and the muzhestvo (courage, backbone) to speak positively in public. There is a certain artificiality (iskusstvennost', navedennost') to the information we get. In the West, people evaluate life based on how they themselves are doing; here we judge how life really is from television, from the collective life of society (zhizn' obshchestva, sobornaia zhizn').
Ivanova: The media is seen as the culprit with all the negative stuff that was not publicized in the past. . . . Young people are developing political feelings. In 1991 I was at the White House with my 16-year-old daughter. . . .who saw that her freedom was at stake. In 1993 those same young people saw that the people who caused the trouble were amnestied. . . . As an editor, I see the style of the regime's politics, and young people don't like this style. They feel de-ideologized, but they are more tolerant than the older generation.
Aksiuchits: It's true that much was hidden in the past, but now news of various mishaps is exaggerated.
Ivanova: Catastrophic feelings were worse a few years ago; now they are declining.
Kariakin: The social movements of the past thirteen years have not included young people. First they went to work in kiosks, now they see the need for an education as a means of getting a good job.
Yakovlev:. . . .The general population (narod, naselenie) never was involved in the formation of politics, so we're talking about the elite. I don't know what people mean by this word narod. . . . The narod were involved in wartime to the extent that were told where to go and they went. There is no narod as Tolstoy saw it. The classics-Gogol, Chekhov-all described the word narod in negative terms. Only Esenin saw that the people were sad and depressed (narod toskuet). Bulgakov gave us Sharikov [the hero of Heart of a Dog], and Erofeev saw them all as alcoholics. In our attempt to analyze and make a prognosis, we have to think about whose consciousness we are discussing, the intelligentsia or the people.
