The Real Threat From Autocracy Is How We Deal With Democracy (continued)

Fareed Zakaria, Opinion Writer for the Washington Post, is an incisive commentator on global political, financial and economic affairs, and never more so then when he and I agree.

His article in the Post today, Democracy Is Decaying Worldwide: American Isn't Immune, echos what I wrote last week for The Hill, The Real Threat From Autocracy Is How We Deal With Democracy, about the erosion of principles and norms from within democracies, including the threat from the autocratic behavior of President Trump.

I had written that a functioning democracy can heal itself, unless a democracy had become neither free nor equitable.  There are palpable fears that the United States is slipping into autocracy...The resilience of democracy in America is being tested by an autocratic president who de-legitimizes ordinary civil discourse through misrepresentation and distortion, aided by complicit actors, such as Chairman Devin Nunes, (R-Calif.) of the House Intelligence Committee and his famously flawed memo on FBI surveillance...While the world's autocracies loom as a threat, the real threat to our welfare and to world peace is how we deal in the democracies with the erosion of basic civil liberties and the rise of domestic social and economic inequality.

In the same vein, Zakaria concludes, "Institutions are collections of rules and norms agreed upon by human beings. If leaders attack, denigrate and abuse them, they will be weakened, and this, in turn, will weaken the character and quality of democracy. The American system is stronger than most, but it is not immune to these forces of democratic decay."

The Real Threat From Autocracy Is How We Deal With Democracy

http://thehill.com/opinion/international/373533-the-real-threat-from-autocracy-is-how-we-deal-with-democracy

In 2017, autocracy — that is, government in which one person wields unlimited authority — seemed to have the upper hand against the troubled democracies of the West.  

Among the democracies, President Donald Trump polarized a divided American electorate, and European elections in Germany, France and elsewhere evidenced equally deep enmity between the political right and left. Brexit all but paralyzed Britain.

In fact, the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index concludes that 2017 produced “the worst decline in global democracy in years,” highlighting, in particular, decline in freedom of expression, including media freedom. 

None of the four democracies above even made the top 10 in the EIU’s ranking of 167 countries.  Germany is 13, the United Kingdom is 14, the United States is 21 and France is 29. Of the Asian democracies, Indonesia fell from 48 to 68 in the rankings, the worst country decline globally, and the world’s most populous democracy, India, fell steeply in the rankings from 32 to 42.

In addition to highlighting freedom of expression and media freedom, the EIU pointed to a widening gap between political elites and electorates; declining popular participation in elections and politics; declining trust in institutions; and erosion of civil liberties.

Meanwhile, autocrats had a field day. The absence of a strong U.S. voice at Davos in January 2017 enabled Chinese Premier Li Keqiang to champion free trade, backed up by Chinese investment in a new silk road spanning Asia, Central Asia, Africa and Europe. Russia’s President Vladimir Putin — would-be impresario of a new world order — was credited with orchestrating much of the election and social chaos in the United States and Europe in 2016 and 2017, as well as tilting Britain’s Brexit vote in favor of leaving the European Union.

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan crushed opposition to his increasingly autocratic rule and cozied up to Putin, distancing himself from Europe and the United States. North Korea’s Kim Jong-Un defied U.S. pressure to end his nuclear weapons program by launching one test missile after another. Wanna-be autocrats Prime Ministers Mateusz Morawiecki of Poland and Viktor Orbán of Hungary defied EU democratic norms from within the union with nationalist agendas. Even President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela held on, despite one of the most mismanaged economies in history, with an inflation rate of 4,000 percent.

However, by year’s end autocracy appeared no less troubled than democracy.

Putin’s interference in the U.S. election processes provoked a significant expansion of U.S. sanctions against Russia. Russian corruption also resulted in the passage of “Magnitsky” legislation in a number of countries, including Canada and the United Kingdom, targeting individuals responsible for serious civil rights violations, as well as government officials complicit in “acts of significant corruption.”

Although Putin is expected to be reelected in March, social discontent has risen with rising poverty. Putin’s reported desire to achieve 70 percent voter turnout with a 70 percent pro-Putin vote to legitimate his next term may be out of reach because of, on the one hand, voter apathy and, on the other hand, growing opposition activism. Russia ranks 135 in the EIU’s Democracy Index.

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s vaunted Silk Road looked less compelling as it ran into political and economic resistance from other countries concerned with rising Chinese influence, including the United States, Australia and the United Kingdom, which criticized China’s indifference to global standards and norms. Although China’s economy still manages growth of almost 7 percent, high and rising debt levels threaten economic stability. Xi may look firmly in place, but so did Putin in 2008 before the Russian economy turned against him. When it did turn, it was not the reformist Putin of 2000-2004 but the autocratic Putin of 2014-2018 who, to maintain his authority, resorted to increasing oppression (despite the claim of popular support).

Xi is headed down the same path in his attempt to control threats to his authority by tightening control of the military, police and social media.  China ranks a low 139 in the Democracy Index.  

It was, however, the sudden, dramatic fall in December 2017 of President Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe (136 in the index), after 30 years ruling over a wrecked Zimbabwean economy and society, that illustrated the risk faced by all autocrats. Instability can appear suddenly when the autocrat fails to anticipate a palace coup or a social upheaval due to social and economic tensions because there is no stabilizing mechanism other than oppression. Anti-government protests in Iran (150 in the index) at the end of 2017 against the economic plight and social oppression of ordinary Iranians came out of nowhere, as well, and threatened Iran’s political and economic stability.

Rather than being islands of stability governed by firm leadership, autocracies are inherently unstable because of limited political participation, social oppression and economic inequality that diminish the welfare of the citizens of those states and threaten world peace.

Democracies are more stable because, due to broader citizen participation, they are better at balancing differing societal interests and adapting to change. History is full of failed autocratic states, but few failed democracies. A functioning democracy can heal itself, unless a democracy has become neither free nor equitable. There are palpable fears that the United States is slipping into autocracy. Political discourse is fractured, and the EIU writes, “Income inequality is higher in the U.S. than in other rich countries and has worsened since the global economic and financial crisis of 2007-09. Studies show that higher income inequality reduces trust in others and undermines social capital.”  

The resilience of democracy in America is being tested by an autocratic president who de-legitimizes ordinary civil discourse through misrepresentation and distortion, aided by complicit actors, such as Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) of the House House Intelligence Committee and his famously flawed memo on FBI surveillance.

While the world’s autocracies loom as a threat, the real threat to our welfare and to world peace is how we deal in the democracies with the erosion of basic civil liberties and the rise of domestic social and economic inequality.

There Is Too Much At Stake In Ukraine To Give Up Now

photo credit

I made the point in an article a few days ago that Ukraine could be at the start of a promising economic recovery (Why I Am Optimistic About Ukraine, Euromaidan Press) that would support a stronger civil society.

The Financial Times this week has two opinion pieces that focus on the one threat to that recovery, the entrenched business and political interests bent on undermining Ukraine's economic and social reforms, as I had discussed in my article.

That both opinion pieces and my article highlight the threat at this time reflects the deep concern in the West that recent political turmoil in Kyiv could derail the reform program.

To conflate the two opinion pieces, both write that there is too much at stake in Ukraine to give up now.

In the first piece, Too Much Is At Stake To Give Up On Ukraine, Tony Barber, FT Europe Editor, warns that if Ukraine "veers off the path of domestic reform it is less likely to flourish as an independent state,"  And, indeed, the current political turmoil in Kyiv around the reform agenda is a serious threat to Ukraine's economic and social development.

However, Barber's observation that the mood has soured and embittered Ukrainians find that "post-Maidan authorities turned out to be no better than their predecessors" does not mean that Ukrainians are ready to give up on reform.  Few Ukrainians would return to the earlier time when Yanukovych and his Donetski thugs lorded over Kyiv and Ukraine.  Therefore, something new has to take its place.  Too many lives have been sacrificed in opposing corruption and Russian aggression.  Attacking the reform agenda is unlikely to dampen Ukrainian civil society's intent to see the reforms through, even if it is likely to result in dramatic moments along the way.

Even so, more can be achieved by civil society with technical and financial help from the West. Francis Malige, EBRD Managing Director for Eastern Europe and Caucasus, in Now Is Not The Time To Give Up On Ukraine, makes the case for Western support; "Giving up on Ukraine means giving up on courageous and determined people, alongside an entire country, at a time when they need us [the West] and when we can protect past successes and achieve much more, if we do it right."  Malige's piece is a convenient checklist of ways that international institutions and bilateral support can help by strengthening the private sector in Ukraine to improve people's well-being, while civil society reforms.

Short of a full-on Russian invasion, it is unlikely that reforms will fail because they have become part of civic culture in Ukraine.  But the reform process does need to keep up momentum so that the benefits--especially economic--become visible and tangible for all Ukrainians.  It is too early to see the full shape of Ukraine's transformation but the elements are there; popular support, civic activism, the realization that change is possible, a maturing multi-party political system and growing familiarity with civic culture in the West to which Ukrainians aspire.

Why I Am Optimistic About Ukraine

http://euromaidanpress.com/2017/12/16/why-i-am-optimistic-about-ukraine/

Article by: Dirk Mattheisen

Buffeted by rapacious oligarchs and invasion by Russia, Ukraine seems an unlikely success story. However, renewed economic growth is fueling a growing sense of optimism and of opportunity. There are a few things getting in the way. But first the good news.

Ukraine’s economy is projected to grow 2.0% this year and then accelerate to 3.5% in 2018 and 4.0% in 2019, driven by a steady growth in consumption of 3% per year and in exports of 1.6% in 2017, 3% in 2018 and 5% in 2019 (recent government estimates of growth are slightly lower but still very similar). Already in 2017 exports to the EU in the first nine months are up 29.1%, which indicates the rapid pace at which Ukraine is taking advantage of access to EU markets). The business press is full of stories about new businesses and investment opportunities, including highly innovative, internationally competitive startups, such as Google’s Grammarly, which was developed by two Ukrainian entrepreneurs in Kyiv, as well as countless “locally-grown” tech startups and micro-enterprises. There is constant chatter about fashion and advertising video shoots in Kyiv, including the recent Apple Watch 3 video, adding cultural flair to the economic momentum.

Ukraine Finance Minister Oleksandr Danyliuk said all the right things in September in the lead up to the World Bank/IMF annual meetings. He pointed to the government’s tough measures to stabilize the economy with the support of a US$17.5b IMF program. He also emphasized the seriousness of the government’s efforts to improve the business climate, such as in tax and customs administration for which Ukraine had hired an international consultancy firm to help run an anti-corruption program and invited the US, Germany, EU, EBRD, and Canada to sit on the supervisory board to ensure the program was not derailed. Danyliuk emphasized that many reforms had been instituted, but it was also now important for the people to feel the effect through improved living standards by not just eliminating high-level corruption but of eliminating petty day-to-day corruption.

However, despite the optimistic outlook, Ukraine needs to take advantage of this period to restructure its domestic economy.  Failure to restructure will slow growth and diminish overall economic prospects.

For example, the World Bank estimates that reforming land ownership laws alone could lift economic growth by 1.5%. This is critical because, as welcome as 4% GDP growth may be, Ukraine has to grow faster for people to feel, as Danyliuk emphasized, a meaningful impact on their well-being. At $2,200, Ukraine’s GDP per capita is roughly a quarter of Russia’s (though more equitably distributed) and among the lowest of the former Soviet republics; to counter Russia’s existential threat to the country, Ukraine needs to increase GDP per capita by several orders of magnitude to demonstrate that its economic model can deliver benefits comparable to other countries.

Ultimately, Ukraine needs to aspire to be a regional economic power in its own right, which would be good for Ukraine and for Europe–nothing would supercharge Ukrainian and EU economic growth like welcoming into the EU 40m talented people with an impressive endowment in resources and a strategic geographic position.

To visualize Ukraine’s economic potential, compare its GDP of about $93 bn to Poland’s GDP of about $480 bn with roughly half the area of Ukraine and the same population. Twenty-five years of serious economic reform separate Polish GDP from Ukraine’s. A more serious effort by Ukraine is necessary to make up the difference in a shorter period of time. As Poland shows, economic growth does not solve all the problems, but it is an essential start.

To make that happen, Ukraine has to get a grip on pervasive corruption that is fueled by lack of respect for the law, ineffective law enforcement and widespread self-interest over civic interest in government and business. Rule of law was the core of the 2014 Revolution of Dignity which, despite substantial progress, remains an aspiration.

Above all, reform has to be credible.

Liberalizing the land market is useless without a reliable cadastral system and market transparency that prevents raiding and speculation. Judicial reform is useless if incompetent or corrupt officials continue to be appointed. The recent appointment of 25 judges with histories of questionable decisions and improbable wealth undermines reform. Criminal charges against public officials, such as those against Ukraine’s General Prosecutor, Yuriy Lutsenko, need to be prosecuted in accordance with the highest legal standards and not subverted by legal artifice that fails to hold wrongdoers accountable. Lack of progress will erode vital international support (as evidenced by the recent halt due to unfulfilled anti-corruption conditions in the EU’s macro-financialassistance program and a slowed IMF program).

Political reform is integral to ending corruption and achieving economic success.

For reform to work, the political process has to serve society’s needs. It can’t if the political and economic elite, including President Poroshenko and members of his government, behave as in the past. The reformists can try to wait out the entrenched interests, risking that the reform process will peter out; or, they can find ways to breath additional life into the process.

Civic activism is essential; and entrenched interests have to support the reform process, which may require some form of selective amnesty for economic crimes committed before the Revolution of Dignity, which these interests fear will expose them to prosecution, and a commitment that they not stand in the way of or undermine further reform. Entrenched interests will not disappear, but they must be made to fall in line.

Timing is crucial. The 2019 presidential election is warming up. It can be a watershed moment in surmounting corruption. President Poroshenko has been effective in leading the economic stabilization program with the IMF and in introducing many of the needed reforms. His resolute defense of Ukraine internationally and support for association with the EU has elevated recognition in the West of Ukraine as a democratic nation distinct and separate from Russia.

However, he has also failed to live up to personal commitments as president, including putting his extensive business interests ahead of the national interest by forming a blind trust; many of his businesses are held in offshore corporations of the type that are used by oligarchs to hide assets and avoid taxes. Extraordinarily wealthy individuals fuel corruption if not checked by law, and they have yet to yield or share power in Ukraine with the next generation of business, government and political leaders who will build the new Ukrainian society. The 2019 election is a good moment for anti-corruption and political reform not just to be declared but to become real in order to unleash the rewards of reform.

Otherwise, popular frustration may overflow. Although recent pro-reform protests in Kyiv fronted by Georgian political activist Mikheil Saakashvili have been small—in part due to the seeming self-interest of its most prominent sponsors, Saakashvili and Yulia Tymoshenko, there is still widespread impatience with the slow pace of reform.

Though the protests have been small, the political risk is not. The “impeach Poroshenko” protest, again led by Saakashvili, is a portent of worse to come if reform is derailed. Public unhappiness will grow, especially if the politically unpopular Porochenko continues to provoke friction with highhanded political assaults on Saakashvili and other opponents and backroom maneuvers to enforce his control of the government. The focus needs to be on advancing anti-corruption and economic reforms and upholding the rule of law, including in politics. Messy disputes (such as this) between anti-corruption authorities and security services and mutual claims of corruption don’t help.

For all the risks, the promise of change is irreversible. Ukrainian society is no longer capable of sliding back into conformity and submission. Ukraine’s transformation into a more just and inclusive society is in its early stages but even now entrenched interests cannot contain Ukrainian society’s new aspirations nor its new economic promise.

Fundamentally, what distinguishes Ukraine is not its historic association with Russia. Cast between competing empires (and sometimes known as the borderlands), Ukraine has a powerful egalitarian tradition based on the independent-minded Cossack warrior-farmer (reviled during Russian-dominated Soviet times as kulaks). This tradition is a distinct cultural identifier setting Ukrainian society apart from a more hierarchical and authoritarian Russian society, something Stalin understood as a threat and attempted to extinguish through state-sponsored genocide in the 1930s.

Completing the key reforms today will transform Ukraine into a democratic nation and an economic power in Europe. In the future, when one speaks of Ukraine–a strong European nation at the heart of a unified Europe—one will be able to say that it’s democratic institutions were formed on its distinctive traditions that Russian imperialism failed to crush and on the renewed vitality of its civil society.

We Are Entitled to Investigate, Debate and Act on Russian Interference

 TheHill.com

American actor Morgan Freeman tossed a firecracker among Russian scholars by lending his voice to a newly formed Committee to Investigate Russia, whose purpose is to confront Russian interference in American democracy.

The response on behalf of Russian scholars was taken up by well-known Russian expatriate journalist, Leonid Bershidsky, in an article on Sept. 20 in Bloomberg entitled, “Wanted: Russia Experts. No Expertise Required.” Sean Keeley makes a similar point in The Russian Interference Racket in The American Interest.

Bershidsky’s complaint against Freeman is that the Committee to Investigate Russia (CIR) and many who write about Russia have no background in the subject. Therefore, they lack the familiarity to provide the nuance necessary to understand Russia. Consequently, their views are ill-informed and incorrect, and too often manifest as Russophobia. These persons should leave Russia to the experts. However, Bershidsky’s complaint is dead wrong.

The issue is not understanding Russia. The issue is how to deal with Russian aggression against Western institutions and values. CIR “investigates” Russia by drawing attention to Russian interference through posting background information and articles published elsewhere. Although decidedly to the right of the spectrum, CIR addresses plenty of Americans' concern about Russian interference that is well-established, if not yet well-understood. This is hardly Russophobic.

Bershidsky disparages by name the competence of CIR’s advisory board members, who are highly accomplished professionals but do not meet his requisite standard for expertise in Russian affairs. That criticism is misplaced. Whatever their specific competencies, they have a stake in the issue. They are affected by Russian interference.

Following Bershidsky’s reasoning, Jimmy Kimmel, the outspoken American comedian and talk show host, has no business opining on health care reform because he is not a health-care specialist. Kimmel however has a personal stake in the healthcare issue that he has spoken about on his show, as do millions of Americans whose voices cannot be shut out because their familiarity with the issues does not rise to a certain standard. The question here is not a particular kind of competence but a personal stake in the consequences. The same goes for Russia’s behavior, climate change, or tax reform.

Morgan Freeman does say that Russia is at war with the U.S., but Russia’s interference in elections in the U.S. and elsewhere, as well as its attempts to sow conflict through social media, is incontestable. There is nothing exaggerated or overblown in what Freeman says in the video. This isn’t hyperbole or jingoism.

Diminished in standing by the collapse of the Soviet Union and the ensuing chaos, Russia under Vladimir Putin has veered toward blaming the West and has chosen to retaliate by invading neighboring countries and by interfering in other countries in areas that are fundamental to those countries’ institutions and values. Russia has legitimate grievances related to its change in circumstances, fed at times by American bungling on the world stage, but it does not follow that Russia’s grievances legitimate its aggression against perceived slights and imagined threats. It doesn’t take special expertise to figure that out.

What Bershidsky decries as lacking expertise and authority is part and parcel of legitimate public debate. Russia experts may feel swamped by the growing public debate on Russia because the importance of the issue to the public has become more manifest with the growing evidence of Russian interference. Russian experts have to speak more loudly to be heard.

Bershidsky quotes Russian scholar, Samuel Greene, to the effect that Russian scholars are not being heard because they are keeping their heads down due to the rise in Russophobia. This is nonsense. The increase in public debate about Russia is a direct consequence of Russian actions against democratic institutions; and, the emergence in some corners of Russophobia does not invalidate or diminish genuine debate about Russia’s behavior. Bershidsky also references Russian affairs expert Mark Galeotti. However, Galeotti does not keep his head down. He continues to publish frequently, as should Greene.

Galeotti’s articles are excellent and should be read by anyone wishing to be well-informed on the nuances of Russian behavior. And, indeed, their voices may be needed to balance out more strident voices, such as Molly McKew, mentioned critically by both Bershidsky and Keeley, who appears on the Committee to Investigate Russia website. An example of an excellent perspective on how to deal with Russian interference is provided by Jan Jankowicz, fellow at the Kennan Institute, in The Only Way to Defend Against Russia’s Information War in the New York Times.

If the drama about Russian influence in the West—or for that matter Trump’s attack on NFL players for speaking their minds--teaches us anything, it is that public debate is the most effective weapon against the real threat of overbearing authority—from governments to extremists of the left and the right, and even the malicious, manipulative voices on social media.

We—the affected parties—are entitled to investigate, debate and act on Russian interference. We are better off if our views are based on objective fact and sound judgement. In the meantime, we need to listen to what legitimate voices across the spectrum have to say.

Dirk Mattheisen is a writer and blogger on political economy and independent consultant on institutional governance and strengthening the role of civil society in government. He is a former assistant secretary of the World Bank Group. Follow him on Twitter  @DirkMattheisen.

Putin's Trump Moment (continued)

Andrey Pertsev of the Carnegie Moscow Center has a commentary, The Active Minority and Passive Majority: Takeaways from Russia’s Regional Elections, that provides more detail and greater insight into the September 10 elections that I wrote about, including the points that the outcome reflects an "increase in voting by the reform-minded minority and a decrease in voter turnout among Putin’s former majority", which, as I wrote,

"A worrisome feature of this election for Putin is that turnout was as low as 14-15 percent in some districts, which magnified the opposition vote, suggesting that Putin may be stung by voter apathy next year. It seems unlikely that a populist insurgent like Trump could disrupt a vote for Putin, but a disaffected public also means that when the insurgency comes it will be unexpected, widespread and messy."

See Putin's Trump Moment

Putin's Trump Moment

© Getty Images

Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump have the same problem, they have squandered their credibility. They both appear clever because by chance they have spent a lifetime getting away with things that have brought down others long ago, and they lied about them. They get away with it because the audacity catches everyone off guard.

However, the lesson of Trump’s first months in office is that, once most people catch on, it is harder to pull off the next audacious stunt. Trump’s agenda from health care to that wall is stalled. Putin has had a longer run in public office but is having trouble with his agenda, too — from lifting oil prices to lifting sanctions.

Now that everyone has caught on to Russia’s election interference and propaganda, Putin’s audacious stunts, despite much hand wringing by his victims, are harder to pull off without a substantial reaction in response. Local elections held in Russia on Sept. 10 fit the pattern and spell possible trouble for next year’s presidential election that Putin is currently expected to win handedly.

On Sept. 10, Putin’s United Russia party swept local elections in the 16 Regions where elections took place, including in Sevastopol in Crimea seized by Russia from Ukraine in 2014. However, opposition candidates in Moscow made surprising gains.

As reported by RFE/RL, United Russia took about 77 percent of the contested seats in Moscow while opposition parties took the remaining 23 percent, putting them on track to “ win a majority of seats in 14 of the more than 100 administrative districts of the capital.” A modest but significant gain for the political opposition in a key region.

Some commentators have made much of this success, arguing that it shows Putin’s declining popularity among the important Moscow electorate. Others conclude it is a ploy by Putin to give the appearance of plurality and vent some of the pressure from alternatives to United Russia before next year’s presidential election.

In one version, Putin will announce in November that he is running for president, but as an independent, effectively throwing United Russia under the bus to deflect public unhappiness from Putin over poor economic conditions and the unpopular and expensive interventions in eastern Ukraine and Syria that are draining lives and the national budget.

Given that Putin is at the pinnacle of his domestic power, it is difficult to believe that election results in Moscow, where everything is controlled from the top, are anything but a ploy in Putin’s presidential reelection strategy. Moreover, poor opposition results elsewhere and numerous election fraud complaints indicate that the modest opposition win in Moscow had at the least Putin’s tacit approval. Since Putin does not intend to give up power, the opposition victories seem to be a tactical concession on the part of Putin.

There is a risk, however, that this very modest ploy will backfire. It is not yet an insurgency, but the appearance of political plurality may escalate into a demand for actual plurality. Such an escalation — like Trump’s surprise election — might effervesce from deep dissatisfaction among ordinary Russians about their poor economic prospects.

Ordinary Russians have already expressed unhappiness with political and economic corruption through the unexpected strength of protests earlier this year. If dissent grows, Putin’s ability to rule through a diminished United Russia party would be undercut. This why there are rumors of him running as an independent.  He would have to build a new coalition, a seemingly improbable event if he can’t hold United Russia together, or he may fall back on suppressing dissent through his control of the justice system and the newly established National Guard that reports directly to him and is trained for such purposes.

In which case, the likely outcome is the social upheaval that Putin wants to avoid (not to mention that Putin might again foment a foreign conflict to rivet the Russian people’s attention and loyalty). A worrisome feature of this election for Putin is that turnout was as low as 14-15 percent in some districts, which magnified the opposition vote, suggesting that Putin may be stung by voter apathy next year. It seems unlikely that a populist insurgent like Trump could disrupt a vote for Putin, but a disaffected public also means that when the insurgency comes it will be unexpected, widespread and messy.

That Putin believes there is a risk of an unpleasant surprise is also suggested by the wave of bomb threats across Russia over the last few days. It may be a prank or a genuine terrorist threat, but it also has the appearance of old tradecraft out of Russia’s security service (FSB) playbook. It’s hard to tell.

It’s an old trick to instill in the Russian people a sense of vulnerability to dark (usually foreign) forces, and their reaction is to look to the central government in Moscow to protect them. Alarmist statements from Russian officials that the bombing threat is unprecedented and could have come from Ukraine fit into this narrative, as does the response of Russian authorities, which has been unremarkable when they are more noted for overreacting. The perception of a Russia under siege from terrorism was, after all, what propelled Putin to power in 2000.

Putin has reason to worry, because, unlike Trump, he is not the disruptor this time. Putin’s game is defensive. He has to fend off challenges to his power. However, his tricks have grown stale and repetition has increased the Russian public’s awareness that the government is failing them. Few believe that elections are fair, the economy is tepid at best, and no one believes that there are no Russian soldiers in eastern Ukraine. Putin and Trump have credibility problems because mistrust of them has only grown and for that reason Putin, like Trump, may win elections but lose the broad appeal necessary to rule.

Dirk Mattheisen is a writer/blogger on political economy and independent consultant on institutional governance as well as strengthening the role of civil society in government.  He is a former assistant secretary of the World Bank Group.  Follow him on @DirkMattheisen or dirkmattheisen.blogspot.com