A Clash of Faiths in Russia

...Nor can the fact that there is no consensus concerning who is responsible for the situation, or how to proceed...

...THE POLITICS OF UNCERTAINTY A Clash of Faiths in Russia by Peter Kenez In the spring of 1990, at the invitation of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, I attended an international conference in Moscow devoted to 20th-century Russian and Soviet history...

...The cost of a bottle of Coke during intermission at the Great Concert Hall in Moscow is six times the price of a ticket...

...Others found catharsis in ferreting out the crimes of the past—albeit rarely their own—and by condemning them in the most uncompromising manner sought to save their souls...

...On the far Left the Communists organize small marches featuring red flags and pictures of Stalin...

...there are no examples to learn from...

...That Russia is going through a crisis of exceptional severity is not subject to debate...

...It was an interesting, even exciting event, the first to bring prominent Soviet and Western scholars together...

...they are now unrelenting enemies...

...Second, it is true, as the opposition charges, that Izvestia, the government newspaper, and the state-owned television both slant news reporting in favor of the President...

...Nothing could be more natural: With the country facing extraordinary problems, different people, depending upon their particular interests, backgrounds and ideology, see different ways out of the crisis...

...and the head of the State Bank, Viktor V. Gerashchenko, is purposely sabotaging reform by fueling inflation...

...In the light of their country's vast problems, one might have expected the politicians to find a way to pull together...

...The firmest anti-Leninists, incidentally, were not necessarily the ones who had shown the most courage when intellectual deviance was dangerous...

...For the people who wrote so much vicious nonsense, the challenge today is justifying previous actions and beliefs...

...Under these circumstances, the political groupings present not carefully thought out programs with predictable costs and gains, but assertions based on little more than a sort of quasi-religious faith...

...Similarly, the cost of a taxi ride to the airport is equal to the average monthly earnings of a junior researcher at the Academy...

...The leaders do not regard one another simply as honest people holding different views...

...such matters were considered political issues of the greatest significance...

...As trustworthy as Yeltsin may be, it is misguided to tailor a constitution to the needs of the moment or to the character of a leader...

...What is more, everyone's ideological baggage contains something from the old order...

...It is understandable that many fear a constitution that gives the President too much power...

...Each group describes the others as Communists...

...This time there were far fewer foreigners, and most of the better known historians stayed away...

...I believe that there is no alternative to a market economy, and that the change has to be quick and complete if it is to succeed...

...The situation in Russia is altogether different...

...At the same time, I think many of the criticisms made of Yeltsin, his team and his programs are not without merit...

...It was not left to them, for example, to determine whether or not to rehabilitate major figures of the Revolution...

...One wishes, however, that people would learn to respect each other's positions...

...The presenters who came to intellectual maturity in the age of Leonid I. Brezhnev were least affected by Communist ideology and verbiage...

...Among the politically responsible the great dividing line is the attitude toward the market...

...It correctly argues that a market economy has not brought well-being and democracy to every country that has tried it, and warns that Russia might end up resembling some of the Third World countries more than Western Europe...

...They are convinced that the recent economic "shock therapy" has only caused misery, and that the capitalist market is inherently immoral...

...Russian historians of the modern period are in a particularly exposed position, since until recently their task was to legitimize an illegitimate order...

...I consider the Russian leader an able, charismatic man and trust his democratic commitments...

...Relatively few miss yesterday' s awful enforced conformity...

...Iama Yeltsin partisan...

...By contrast, the strongest critics of the USSR, for example Martin Malia, take pleasure in the current developments and, with possibly too much confidence, predict success...

...In some respects, it is reassuring to be in Moscow...

...To be sure, the electric atmosphere in the hall that one felt three years ago was missing, and the size of the Russian audience was greatly reduced...

...Supporters of the Civic Union leader Arkady Volsky, and of Parliament Speaker Ruslan I. Khasbulatov, also include some intelligent people...

...In a functioning political system, it is possible to proceed with some confidence...

...Perhaps, too, some of the foreigners asked to come decided against doing so because it is no longer a novelty either to meet Soviet colleagues or to hear them denounce the entire Bolshevik experiment...

...Interestingly, the same division exists among Western observers of Russia...

...Decisions about interpreting turning points in the life of Soviet society were made at the highest level and the historians simply executed orders...

...you feel sorry for them, rather than worry about their threat to political stability...

...The way one looks at the past, of course, has immediate political relevance...

...Apparently it is impossible to remain completely unaffected by a lifetime of political experience...

...Through omissions, outright lies and conscious misinterpretations they fashioned an ideological superstructure without which the Soviet state could not have existed...

...In addition, the political structure is fragile and the future is uncertain...

...Indeed, the Russians generally are as sharply divided in their political views as the historians...

...Contemporary history was too important to be left to the historians...

...Nonetheless, their seriousness cannot be ignored...

...The price structure is crazy...

...Not surprisingly the old, who had spent decades supporting a wicked system, by and large found it harder to accept starting entirely anew than did those who had grown up under "real, existing socialism...

...Backers of economic reform would respond by saying, first you create the demand and soon there will be Russian entrepreneurs attempting to satisfy it and thereby make money...

...Third, I agree that Russians have a legitimate concern for their fellow citizens just beyond the newly drafted borders...

...Some who cannot tolerate big ideological breaks tried—probably unconsciously—to paste over the chasms...

...Scholars on the Left, for example Stephen Cohen, are pessimistic: They consider the celebration of the market mindless and distasteful...

...No one disputes that the standard of living of the vast majority of citizens has declined disastrously, that crime has increased, and that the gap between the new rich and the poor is growing...

...Peter Kenez, afrequei11 New Leader contributor, is a professor of history at the University of California, Santa Cruz...

...I have alow opinion of his opponents: Khasbulatov is a politician who does not keep his word...

...Finally, even though the demand that the long-suffering Russian people must somehow be protected from the pain of change probably is not realistic, it is by no means morally reprehensible...

...The spectrum of opinions this April was broader than three years ago, but once again the speakers implicitly and explicitly attacked one another...

...Yeltsinites repudiate the past thoroughly, eschew nationalism, pay little attention to the plight of their countrymen beyond the newly created borders, look upon the West as an example, expect Western assistance, believe that radical economic reforms are the key to recovery, and already see them achieving positive results...

...the Congress of People's Deputies has no meaningful economic or social program...

...The regime forced on these people a conformity more severe than any it imposed on other branches of intellectual life...

...The little stalls that have now appeared on Moscow's main avenues, and that sell almost exclusively foreign products few people can afford, repel them...

...It was so much easier in the past...

...The elderly ladies and the war veterans with their medals who come to these marches are a sad group...

...They reasonably point out that the country cannot live for long on second-rate Western goods while producing nothing of its own...

...Further, their underestimation of Yeltsin's chances of building a capitalist, democratic Russia becomes a justification in retrospect of their faith in the defunct Soviet system...

...it can hardly afford to pay junior researchers a living wage...

...Last month, exactly three years later, I participated in a similar conference...

...Perhaps less people were invited to keep down costs...

...So long as the uncertainties that have produced this clash of faiths persist, the language of compromise will remain beyond the politicians' grasp in Russia...

...Thus, although Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin's name was not mentioned at the Academy sessions, the speakers actually were taking positions for or against him...

...no one knows what tomorrow may bring...

...The Right wing—how ironic it is to use this label for those who resist private enterprise—advocates the continued subsidization of industry, finds dependence on the West painful and insulting, and espouses one or another version of Russian nationalism...

...They did not repudiate everything from the Leninist vision, and they imagined themselves as having been more courageous than in fact they possibly could have been...

...Not only did this fail to happen, but the political struggle has deepened...

...Their bitter disagreements notwithstanding, the majority of scholars bemoaned the lack of a new paradigm, a new system that would enable them to interpret historical material...

...On the far Right one finds the followers of Vladimir Zhirinovsky, "the Russian Mussolini," whose sanity is very much in doubt...

...since the collapse of Communism there has been nothing except anarchy and misery...

...The views of the extremists may be disregarded...

...Still, I found the meeting most interesting—not so much for what was said, but by whom and how...

...The differences between the two are worth noting...

...The conference was a micro-cosm of the larger society...

...Almost immediately you make the banal observation that life goes on in spite of all...

...This is an easy accusation to make, given that there is hardly anyone on the scene who did not play a fairly prominent role in the ancien regime...

...The Academy, the glory of Soviet intellectual life, is in difficult straits...

...The country is experiencing an unparalleled transformation...

...After all, who can be certain Yeltsin will be the first person to hold the office when the document is adopted...

...People go to movies, go to restaurants, and not everyone is constantly preoccupied with the country's troubles...

...everyone knows what the ground rules are and acts accordingly...

...And the Soviet system, to put it mildly, did not nourish trust, let alone accommodating opposing points of view...

...Consequently, they tend to defend their own positions with uncommon obstinacy, and to regard any rival notion as the road to disaster...

...When plans are drawn up the results can pretty much be anticipated, and that makes horse-trading possible...

...There seems to be another reason for the inability of the various warring factions to compromise...

...There was a visible generation gap...

...You see, they are saying, the Russians are incapable of forging a democratic order...

...Surely these people have nothing in common with the muscular followers of Lenin in 1917...