The FRONTLINE Interviews
Lev Gudkov
Russian sociologist
Lev Gudkov is a Russian sociologist and director of the Levada Center, a non-governmental polling firm based in Moscow.
This is the transcript of an interview with FRONTLINE's Michael Kirk conducted on July 12, 2017. It has been translated from Russian and edited in parts for clarity and length.
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Putin's Political Rise
<i>The first question, asking Mr. Gudkov about the rise of Vladimir Putin, was not recorded.</i>
In the 1990s, before Putin became the president, the relation to the United States was mostly positive.We had been looking up to the West.We were prepared for integration with the European community. We were willing to embrace democracy.This was the most popular attitude among Russians.
The first burst of anti-American attitudes started before Putin.At that time, Mr. [Yevgeny] Primakov was the prime minister.This had to do with a bombing of Serbia by NATO.Back then, the first anti-American campaign was launched.This was a propaganda campaign that lasted for a very short time, and then it kind of died out.Why we were mostly positive? Because most people realized that there was nowhere else to look to if we were looking at building a democratic society, if we were to do any economic reform.
In the 1990s, people were mostly positive. Up to 40 percent of the people believed that we needed closer links with the United States, with Europe, and we should even join NATO.There were no strong factors against it. We didn't notice any negative factors.
When Putin came, pretty quickly the situation began to change.For Putin, it was very important to give a bad name to the party of reforms and everything that had to do with Western values.Slowly and gradually, propaganda turned around, and we saw a lot of anti-Western rhetoric, walking away from Western values, and we have become quite nostalgic about the Soviet time. …
Putin's Vision for Russia in his First Term
… So Putin comes in, the society, the Russian people, what did they want from him?What did they expect from him? What did he have to deliver to them at the very beginning?
As you know, Putin was not elected; he was appointed, so he did not come to power.He was a successor of the previous president, so he needed a new legitimacy.As to what people expected?First of all, by that time people wanted the [economic] crisis to end. We were in a deep economic crisis that had to do with the transformation process.That was the first biggest expectation.
Secondly, people wanted to see an end to the Chechen war, which was perceived as an unfair war. That applies to both the first and the second war.People were expecting some sort of solution to the problems in northern Caucasus.
And thirdly, there was a very significant expectation. People were expecting that from the president, people wanted the status of a superpower to be restored.… And many people feel that it has been done, as Putin [has] resisted American influence and protected the interests of Russia.
How did people feel about Putin's decision to take, under the state, the television networks?
Well, initially, there [were] a lot of concerns, and people were troubled by that. But then people came to terms with it, because when Putin came, the economic situation changed quite dramatically.By 2003, market mechanisms began to work, and the [economic] crisis was passing. Also by that time, oil prices had soared, and the country could change its social policy.It was very paternalistic. The social expenditures have risen dramatically.All together it led to the fact that people's incomes grew very quickly, real incomes. Not nominal but real incomes have been growing between 2003 and 2012 at the rate of 6 to 8 percent per year.
We could say that Russians never lived as well as they did during that time frame due to high oil prices and redistribution of wealth, etc.Despite the signs of a strengthening authoritarian regime, people were willing to agree to accept it.Their expectations that Putin would take the country out of the deep crisis of 1990s came true.
The next high priority was the restoration of the feeling of pride, self-respect, satisfaction.Gradually Putin gave the Russian people that feeling that Russia was restoring its weight in the world. …
Putin Consolidates Power in his Second Term
… So that by I guess 2003, 2004, he has the country in a different state of mind.There's this conversation about nonparticipation from people in return for economic well-being. There is safety, there is security, and [in return] they don’t get in the government's business.
Yes, starting from that time, we have seen more and more administrative control over political parties.Many political parties have become pseudo-political pluralism.They were controlled, and those who were not happy with the situation were pushed away from the political arena.
Besides, they did a number of significant administrative reforms that have led to a greater level of centralization of power: no more elections of the governors, no more elections for city mayors, no self-governance.Those who were not pleased with that were removed from the political space.They did not have a chance. This was especially noticeable after mass protests in 2011, 2012.1At that time, a whole number of laws, a bloc of 35 amendments, were passed, and those amendments have limited the rights of political parties and public organizations.That actually introduced full control over public opinion.
1
So back from the very beginning, not 2011, but back, he's slowly but surely creating this sort of soft dictatorship or soft authoritarianism that is taking over one by one.Let me ask you about a moment, the Beslan moment.Was he compensating for something when he acted so precipitously at Beslan, something he needed to appeal to the population about?
At that time, the threat of terrorism was pumped up.When he came, there was a lot of fear and panic. There was a feeling of total and utter threat coming from Islamic terrorists.He came when Moscow and other Russian cities have seen a number of bombings, especially in Moscow. There were very many victims.
There was an act of terror at Dubrovka, and then came Beslan, which showed that the Kremlin on one hand demonstrated its willingness to act roughly and rapidly suppressing terrorists without negotiating.2At the same time, they blocked any opportunity to criticize those actions of the army, any alternative attitude to this.
2
At the moment when terrorists blew up a theater at Dubrovka and [at the school siege] in Beslan, there were some strong negative feelings about the special services that eliminated terrorists, because many hostages lost their lives.Gradually, propaganda convinced people that this was the only way out of the situation and that police acted in the only possible way, that this was the best way to act.By controlling media space, you are ready to have people accept your opinion and your attitude. …
So when he gives the speech in Munich, what is the bounce that he gets in Russia?How does the population react to that forceful speech?
That speech by itself, I don't think many people have heard it; it was not broadly publicized.But the consequences of that speech, what we saw in the social policy and information policy, had quite an impact.Since then, we have seen a lot of systemic anti-Western propaganda and rhetoric.The general attitude was all hinged around the traditional bonds.Russia shouldn’t be ashamed of its past, meaning of course the Soviet past, the Gulag. Putin used to say that every country has its dark periods in the past, its skeletons in the closet.We have great history that we should be proud of, and we should not focus on the painful themes like Gulag repressions, the unpleasant sides of the Soviet history.
Since that time, we turned toward strengthening of propaganda of Russian nationalism and patriotism, some elements of the Russian Empire ideology, walking away from liberalism and democracy, which grew stronger and stronger by the end of 2010.In that context, this is not just a new kind of regime, soft authoritarianism.This was the restoration of some Soviet practices at the level of institutions. We were coming back to some parts of the Soviet totalitarianism. …
The Reset and Arab Spring: Putin as Prime Minister
So that when the switch happens and [Dmitry] Medvedev is president for a while, what's people's reaction to that openness?
There were ambiguous feelings and reactions to that.But at the time, we have seen some signs of people being tired of Putin, and the emerging middle class wanted to see reforms continued.Medvedev’s rhetorics, his slogans like “Freedom is better than [non-] freedom,” “We need investments,” free information, new institutions and this thing and the other—he raised a lot of expectations.There was an illusion that a new leader would change the situation.
However, fairly quickly, people realized that he was just a shadow of Mr. Putin.He was not an independent political leader. He was an executor of Putin’s will.People realized that Putin had the real power.Starting from about 2008, 2009, we have seen that the level of trust and popularity for Mr. Medvedev has fallen sharply. …
Putin Returns to the Presidency, Sparking Protests and a Crackdown
So by 2012, when the protests have happened in ’11 and ’12, when people are actually holding up signs that say "Stop Putin," and some of that has been generated by social media, some of it, a little bit by Hillary Clinton, Putin is unhappy with the protests.But is it really a substantial number of people that he has to deal with, or is he still quite popular at that moment?
The first reaction to mass protests in 2011, 2012, I think those protests caused strong panic in the country leadership, first of all in the Kremlin.The Kremlin did not know what to think about it. They were not sure.The ghost of color revolutions, the fate of [Romania’s Nicolae] Ceausescu or the fate of [Libya’s Muammar al-]Qaddafi is known to all dictators.That's how people felt at the time of big demonstrations.
But the Kremlin appreciated the situation quite quickly, and they realized that this was not strictly a political movement.This was first of all an ethical movement against fraud during elections, against strengthening authoritarian rule, against censorship.
The protest movement and the opposition, as we say in Russian, have not created any effective political organizations. There was no program of actions.So this ethical protest did not achieve any results before it died out and ceased to exist.And people, again, felt disappointed that they could not do anything to change the situation.Putin used that situation, and he tightened the nuts.He took some measures to strengthen the control of public [social] organizations.
The slogans of the protesters, of the movement that began as the protest against election fraud, later became more anti-Putin, anticorruption, anti-lawlessness.There were no social effects, though, and quite quickly, the protests slowed down.The countermeasures that were taken were also defiantly severe. There were some lawsuits, and they were broadly covered.The sentences were quite severe, and it was not only organizers or coordinators of the movement, but also to random people.And that was a demonstrative severity of punishment. It impressed people.Many people shared the ideas of the protesters, maybe 50 percent of the people or maybe a bit less.But then, after the propaganda was put to work and the protest movement was given a bad name, and they used all kinds of things saying that protesters are all very wealthy people wearing expensive fur coats and this thing and the other, that they were paid to protest by the West, that they were the fifth column, traitors of national interests, that they were paid by Pentagon, especially in the provinces, this was taken as a fact.
Putin Asserts Himself on the World Stage in his Third Term
Does Putin have a pollster?Does Putin, during this time in 2012 on, care about the polls, care about what people think?Is he testing it and assessing it like a politician in the West, or does he have a different constituency that he needs to worry about?
At that time, almost two-thirds of the people were prepared to vote for Putin, and I'm talking about all groups of the population.There were some differences, though, in the attitudes in the different social groups.I cannot say that there is a core group of Putin's fans or electors.We're talking about two-thirds of the country’s population, after all.Attitude toward Putin consists of two things.One is a feeling that there is really no alternative. There is no politician out there. All competitors have been eliminated. They're not visible in the political arena.
Secondly, there is still hope and illusion that Putin would be able to stay on the growth path of the economy and level of life that we saw between 2003 and 2010, 2012.The combination of lack of alternative and illusions creates a stable attitude toward this man.Besides, people simply fear crisis and instability, a return to 1990s that were very painful to most people in the country.
People see Putin not as much as a national leader but as a politician with a specific plan.It’s very important that he is talking about restoration of some Soviet values and the Soviet authorities that support, help and control people. So people can rid themselves of responsibility by throwing it at the authorities.This policy raises very negative emotions.People think, especially in the last few years, that the authorities are very corrupted, that they are above the law, and Putin in one way or another neutralized the influence of a corrupt bureaucracy.
Therefore, this mechanism of shifting responsibility, removing it from Putin to other branches of power, is very important.This is what people call a Teflon president. Criticism simply doesn’t stick to Putin.People would blame the government, Mr. Medvedev, the red tape, the police, everyone.It's like the old tradition. The czar is good; however, the nobility are evil.
To what extent is something like Crimea, Donbas, to what extent are things like that helping to solidify his support?
This was very important indeed.We have done a number of surveys starting in 2009 after the economic recession of ’08.Putin's rating, the level of approval, has been slowly but noticeably coming down, and he hit the low point in December 2013. It's exactly at that time about 50 percent of the people thought that Putin was not fulfilling his promises.People were tired of Putin, and 47 percent of the respondents said they wanted another leader to run in the next elections with a different political agenda, not representing United Russia and the same old team.This was the lowest point in his rating. That's when we saw a lot of concerns and unhappiness. …At that same time, we saw rapid change in attitudes to Ukraine.Our annexation of Crimea and an open confrontation with the West brought about the wave of patriotism and pride that Russia stood up for its values, returning Crimea. It’s regaining its greatness; it is returning to its traditional role as a superpower.This was taken as a sign of its national resurrection.Immediately Putin became very popular once again, and in April and May, the level of his popularity reached the maximum level of all times, 87 percent approved of what he was doing. It’s unreal.
The middle class, the urban population, was not happy with Putin, split up.Most people joined the majority and supported Putin, which has given him a lot of confidence.Even today, his rating is 81 to 83 percent, which is slightly lower than the peak level.This was a very important time that essentially changed the atmosphere of the country.
Now the euphoria is gone. We see that people are sobering up. But the level of trust is very high.
What did the euphoria come from? What was it based on?The taking of Crimea, the pushing back?
Yes. Joining of the Crimea, first of all.A high level of approval for Putin's actions and his policy in Donbas, in eastern Ukraine and toward the Ukraine in general.There was no single opinion among the public. Public opinion is split.Generally, there is an understanding that when Russia joined with Crimea and when it launched this hidden war in Donbas it broke all the norms of international law, but the propaganda convinces people that Putin is acting in the right way because he is protecting the Russian population from discrimination by the nationalists in the Ukraine.He is saving the Russian people from genocide, and that justifies his actions, because he is protecting our guys, the Russians.
That feeling that he stands up for our people, for the interests of Russia, raised the level of trust.Joining of the Crimea has become a symbol of Russia regaining its traditional role of a power that has weight and that can affect the post-Soviet territory and be ready to influence situations in the world.The situation in Syria or a conflict with Turkey, that sharp conflict or conflicts, and the threats of a big war, helps to consolidate the society around the authorities.
One of the threads we've lost in this conversation is the view of America by Russians during these times, maybe even since Obama and Hillary Clinton.The happiness or displeasure with America has ebbed and flowed as well.But by Ukraine it seems America is very interested in supporting the people that are fighting against the Russians.
… Starting from the mid-2000s and after the Munich speech [of 2007], people have been convinced that America was in opposition to Russia and it was acting against Russia in a hostile way, that it’s some kind of metaphysical entity.It was impossible to deny or reject that— a kind of political intoxication of the people.It was accepted in Crimea, and the following euphoria and then the events in Ukraine were used by the propaganda machine in that same context.America is a traditional enemy: they're hostile; they are anti; they have alien values; they [promote] foreign views and attitudes which are not welcome in the Russian society.That's all happened against the old backdrop of the Soviet past when we were opposing the United States and there was a lot of ideology against the U.S., the whole complex of Cold War mentality.
Today’s Putin propaganda has raised those old templates. They have changed the formats here and there.They have made some links to the liberal values which are foreign to the Russian society.They have made links to the issue of same-sex marriages and pedophilia, and that's impressed people very much.The first oppressive law was called Dima Yakovlev Law because of the situation with children that were adopted by American families, children from Russia adopted by American families.The propaganda claimed that those children are getting abused, that Americans don’t treat those children well, that there's sexual harassment against those children.
Therefore this link between liberalism, pedophilia, homosexuality and the other created a new set of new conservative ideas, a very interesting combination indeed.This was quite important, because this justified the conservative course launched by Putin—protection of the Russian values, Russian orthodoxy, spiritual life, morals, ethics—against the liberal West: America that allows everything, that is immoral.3This is on the one side.
3
On the other side, after the annexation of the Crimea, we have seen other things.Despite the patriotic euphoria, despite the pride of the new empire, people have very strong fear of a possible third world war.People were afraid that confrontation could bring a big war, and many respondents that we were talking to say that we are already in a state of war; however, we are just in the cold phase of the big war.When we joined the Crimea, we have shown our teeth. We made people respect us.That gave a rise to self-respect and national pride. But on the other hand, people felt strong fear.
Against that backdrop, we have seen a lot of discreditation [sic] of Obama administration that was hostile to Russia and Secretary [of State] Clinton, the situation of fall of last year before the elections was presented in a very biased way.Propaganda pictured Trump as a new president, as a new figure in American policy, American politics, someone who could really reset the relations with Russia, get rid of sanctions and restore good relations with Putin, naturally on Putin's terms.
This raised a lot of expectations.Russian mass media was very biased.They were very critical and unfair about Clinton, and they were very much pro-Trump.4There was quite a bit of sexism in many statements about Hillary Clinton.This has produced serious consequences, because anti-American attitudes have really started coming down.In summer 2016, about 83 percent were anti-American. After election of President Trump, that number went down to 48, 49 percent.The trend was still there.However, the level of anti-Americanism has come down sharply.
4
As you know, the parliament members had a celebration after the results of the election were announced.However, the behavior of President Trump and the continuation of sanctions have caused quite a bit of disappointment, and now we see the rise of anti-Americanism again. …
Intervention in the U.S. Election
Were people proud of the allegations being made in America that Putin and the Russian troll factories had hacked and altered the American election?
More likely yes, although it’s not much talked about.People kind of like it because it’s a manifestation of hidden power.This is viewed as a recognition of greater influence that we have in the world.This blackmail policy, the policy of provocations in Syria and in other parts of the world is taken as a demonstration of strength, as a demonstration of Russia's influence in the international scene.And people kind of like it. …
You wrote in an article that the Russian people see the growth and even the West as utopian, but the grapes [of utopia] seem out of their reach.What do you mean by that?
I meant that there is no other example of well-being, of development, of social protection other than the Western society out there.That's why the attitudes to the United States and to the West in general is ambivalent.This is not something that emerged only recently.This is what we have seen in the beginning of the 20th century.Remember, Stalin’s slogan that he raised in 1929: “Let’s catch up with America and pass it.” This was a very important slogan back then.This was one of the most important things for the people. It was very important for our collective identity. This was part of the mass consciousness.
The West was perceived in a very idealistic, sugarcoated way, in a utopian way.It was a picture of something that Russians would like to have, too.But again, they realized that they would never have it; they would never have the lives like people have in the West. And that's caused the response.There was a huge contrast between the ideal situation and the real conditions of their country.People were suffering sometimes masochistic inferiority complex, and they wanted to get rid of that irritating factor.They wanted to get rid of that image of utopian prosperity.
It’s really dubious. On one hand, it was very positive.But on the other hand, it could very quickly turn into aggression, jealousy, envy, for America and the West in general.Again, it was built upon the foundation of the Soviet ideology, easily agitated by propaganda, that pictured the world in denial—your own weakness.If we cannot live like that, we have to find an explanation why not.And the easiest explanation on the surface is that the West is trying not to let us.The West doesn't want to deal with strong Russia, and it’s trying to eliminate it.
Many people, 17 to 18 million, believe in very irrational myths like the West wants to have only a few million people living in Russia, someone who would work in the oil and gas industry and serve the pipelines, and the rest of the population should be gotten rid of, the ideas that could be very popular and ascribed to Hitler.
Thank you.
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