Sovereign democracy
Encyclopedia
Sovereign democracy is a term that with regard to Russian politics was first used by Vladislav Surkov
on the 22nd of February 2006 in a speech before a gathering of the Russian political party United Russia
. According to Surkov, sovereign democracy is:
This term was used thereafter by political figureheads such as Sergei Ivanov
, Vladimir Putin
, and Boris Gryzlov
.
Sovereign Democracy in Russia was realised in the form of a dominant-party system
which was put into place in 2007 when as a result of the Russian legislative election of 2007
the political party United Russia
, headed by president Vladimir Putin
, without forming a government, formally became the leading and guiding force in Russian society not unlike the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
. Concrete priorities and orientations of Sovereign Democracy were conceptionalized in President Putin's Plan.
, Mikhail Gorbachev
, Mikhail Kasyanov
and by several foreign officials.
Yuri Semyonov has written:
Criticizing the term in an interview for "Expert", Dmitry Medvedev
pointed out that sovereignty
and democracy
are from different conceptual categories and fusing them is impossible. "If you take the word 'democracy' and start attaching qualifiers to it that would seem a little odd. It would lead one to think that we're talking about some other, non-traditional type of democracy."
On the 19th July, 2006, Mikhail Gorbachev
criticized the cancellation of elections in single-member constituencies as well as the raising of barriers for participation in the Duma to 7%. He remarked that "these innovations into legislation cannot be justified by theories of 'sovereign' or 'managed' democracy. Limitations that may be found to be necessary when the very existence of the government and its citizens may be threatened must be looked upon as temporary, and not elevated into principles, like is done by the theorists of 'sovereign' and 'managed' democracy. These kinds of definitions distort the essence of democracy, just like the concepts of 'socialist' and 'people's' democracy before them".
Whilst talking about sovereign democracy Mikhail Kasyanov
pointed out that "... the aims of this doctrine are quite clear: the concentration and holding of political power and property at any cost. The consequences of this are already evident, including the glorification of populism, the steady destruction of private and public institutions and the departure from the principals of the law, democracy, and the free market."
Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs
Daniel Fried
has stated in an interview that
Leon Aron writes that "Russian wits like to say, 'sovereign democracy' and 'democracy' are as different as 'electric chair' and 'chair.'"
the participants were able to agree upon the fact that all of them want to live in an independent and democratic country.
In October 2006 the head institute of international welfare of the Russian Academy of Sciences
published an anthology of "The Conception and Identifying of Democracy". It used Fareed Zakaria's
idea of the existence of a non-liberal democracy. The authors prove that throughout the history of western civilization, several democratic systems such as Aristocratic, Oligarchic, Egalitarian and National democracies replaced one another. Even more specific are the Chinese's ways of determining democracy. The democratic systems of the various countries of the European Union
also vary greatly, for example the French system is based primarily on the model of a strong national government.
Special interest is placed upon the theory of "Aristocratic Democracy" developed by the Italian historian de Ruggero. According to this theory, during the Middle Ages peasants had all of the rights of citizens and even maintained the right to elect monarchs. In western Europe there existed real aristocratic parliaments which were picked only by birth right. The vast majority of the population was looked upon as "unworthy" of receiving full citizen's rights. In this manner liberal democracy is only a try at adapting the norms of aristocratic democracy to the needs of the political system of today.
The current liberal democracy is one of the many variations of a democratic system. This kind of approach serves to advocate a scientific basis for the theory of Sovereign democracy.
In November 2007 a book entitled "Sovereign democracy in a Constitutionally-right-wing Dimension" was published by "Russian Newspaper". It presented itself as a compilation of the articles and materials of the leading jurists of the Russian Federation including Valery Zorkin
and holds a constitutional basis for said concept.
Vladislav Surkov
Vladislav Yuryevich Surkov is a Russian businessman and politician. Currently he is a First Deputy Chief of Staff of the President of the Russian Federation and a top aide to Vladimir Putin. Vladislav Surkov is widely seen as the main ideologist of the Kremlin...
on the 22nd of February 2006 in a speech before a gathering of the Russian political party United Russia
United Russia
United Russia is a centrist political party in Russia and the largest party in the country, currently holding 315 of the 450 seats in the State Duma. The party was founded in December 2001, through a merger of the Unity and Fatherland-All Russia parties...
. According to Surkov, sovereign democracy is:
a society's political life where the political powers, their authorities and decisions are decided and controlled by a diverse Russian nation for the purpose of reaching material welfare, freedom and fairness by all citizens, social groups and nationalities, by the people that formed it.
This term was used thereafter by political figureheads such as Sergei Ivanov
Sergei Ivanov
Sergei Borisovich Ivanov is a Russian senior official and statesman. He was Minister of Defence from March 2001 to February 2007, Deputy Prime Minister from November 2005 to February 2007, and the First Deputy Prime Minister from February 2007 to May 2008...
, Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin served as the second President of the Russian Federation and is the current Prime Minister of Russia, as well as chairman of United Russia and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Russia and Belarus. He became acting President on 31 December 1999, when...
, and Boris Gryzlov
Boris Gryzlov
Boris Vyacheslavovich Gryzlov , is a Russian politician and current Speaker of Russia's State Duma . He is one of the leaders of the largest Russian political party, United Russia...
.
Sovereign Democracy in Russia was realised in the form of a dominant-party system
Dominant-party system
A dominant-party system, or one-party dominant system, is a system where there is "a category of parties/political organizations that have successively won election victories and whose future defeat cannot be envisaged or is unlikely for the foreseeable future." A wide range of parties have been...
which was put into place in 2007 when as a result of the Russian legislative election of 2007
Russian legislative election, 2007
Legislative elections were held in the Russian Federation on 2 December 2007. At stake were the 450 seats in the State Duma, the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia . Eleven parties were included in the ballot, including Russia's largest party, United Russia, which was supported by...
the political party United Russia
United Russia
United Russia is a centrist political party in Russia and the largest party in the country, currently holding 315 of the 450 seats in the State Duma. The party was founded in December 2001, through a merger of the Unity and Fatherland-All Russia parties...
, headed by president Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin served as the second President of the Russian Federation and is the current Prime Minister of Russia, as well as chairman of United Russia and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Russia and Belarus. He became acting President on 31 December 1999, when...
, without forming a government, formally became the leading and guiding force in Russian society not unlike the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union was the only legal, ruling political party in the Soviet Union and one of the largest communist organizations in the world...
. Concrete priorities and orientations of Sovereign Democracy were conceptionalized in President Putin's Plan.
Critics of "Sovereign democracy"
The term "Sovereign democracy" was critiqued as far-fetched and meaningless by Dmitry MedvedevDmitry Medvedev
Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev is the third President of the Russian Federation.Born to a family of academics, Medvedev graduated from the Law Department of Leningrad State University in 1987. He defended his dissertation in 1990 and worked as a docent at his alma mater, now renamed to Saint...
, Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev is a former Soviet statesman, having served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991, and as the last head of state of the USSR, having served from 1988 until its dissolution in 1991...
, Mikhail Kasyanov
Mikhail Kasyanov
Mikhail Mikhailovich Kasyanov - was the Prime Minister of Russia from May 2000 to February 2004.He is the leader of the People's Democratic Union and an ex-member of the opposition coalition "The Other Russia".-Political career:...
and by several foreign officials.
"Sovereign democracy" is a Kremlin coinage that conveys two messages: first, that Russia's regime is democratic and, second, that this claim must be accepted without demanding any proof, period. Any attempt at verification will be regarded as unfriendly and as meddling in Russia's domestic affairs.
Yuri Semyonov has written:
The concept of sovereignty relates to government as a whole, and not to a certain form of rule or to a political regime. Democracy can be direct or representative, real (which has never actually existed in the human history), formal (as in antiquity, or the modern Western countries), or a fiction (as in the USSR and other so-called socialist countries).
Criticizing the term in an interview for "Expert", Dmitry Medvedev
Dmitry Medvedev
Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev is the third President of the Russian Federation.Born to a family of academics, Medvedev graduated from the Law Department of Leningrad State University in 1987. He defended his dissertation in 1990 and worked as a docent at his alma mater, now renamed to Saint...
pointed out that sovereignty
Sovereignty
Sovereignty is the quality of having supreme, independent authority over a geographic area, such as a territory. It can be found in a power to rule and make law that rests on a political fact for which no purely legal explanation can be provided...
and democracy
Democracy
Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...
are from different conceptual categories and fusing them is impossible. "If you take the word 'democracy' and start attaching qualifiers to it that would seem a little odd. It would lead one to think that we're talking about some other, non-traditional type of democracy."
On the 19th July, 2006, Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev is a former Soviet statesman, having served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991, and as the last head of state of the USSR, having served from 1988 until its dissolution in 1991...
criticized the cancellation of elections in single-member constituencies as well as the raising of barriers for participation in the Duma to 7%. He remarked that "these innovations into legislation cannot be justified by theories of 'sovereign' or 'managed' democracy. Limitations that may be found to be necessary when the very existence of the government and its citizens may be threatened must be looked upon as temporary, and not elevated into principles, like is done by the theorists of 'sovereign' and 'managed' democracy. These kinds of definitions distort the essence of democracy, just like the concepts of 'socialist' and 'people's' democracy before them".
Whilst talking about sovereign democracy Mikhail Kasyanov
Mikhail Kasyanov
Mikhail Mikhailovich Kasyanov - was the Prime Minister of Russia from May 2000 to February 2004.He is the leader of the People's Democratic Union and an ex-member of the opposition coalition "The Other Russia".-Political career:...
pointed out that "... the aims of this doctrine are quite clear: the concentration and holding of political power and property at any cost. The consequences of this are already evident, including the glorification of populism, the steady destruction of private and public institutions and the departure from the principals of the law, democracy, and the free market."
Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs
Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs
The Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs is a position within the American Department of State that leads the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs charged with implementing American foreign policy in Europe and Eurasia, and with advising the Under Secretary for...
Daniel Fried
Daniel Fried
Daniel Fried is a senior career diplomat of the United States who carries the rank of Ambassador. He is presently serving as a Special Envoy to facilitate the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp located in Cuba. Previously, he was the top U.S. diplomat in Europe, and prior to that he was...
has stated in an interview that
I get nervous when people put labels in front of democracy. Sovereign democracy, managed democracy, people's democracy, socialist democracy, Aryan democracy, Islamic democracy - I am not a big fan of adjectives. Managed democracy doesn't sound like democracy. Sovereign democracy strikes me as meaningless."
Leon Aron writes that "Russian wits like to say, 'sovereign democracy' and 'democracy' are as different as 'electric chair' and 'chair.'"
Proponents of "Sovereign democracy"
In August 2006 a round table was held by the heads of the most influential political powers of the Russian Federation in order to discuss the concept of sovereign democracy. According to the Newspaper IzvestiaIzvestia
Izvestia is a long-running high-circulation daily newspaper in Russia. The word "izvestiya" in Russian means "delivered messages", derived from the verb izveshchat . In the context of newspapers it is usually translated as "news" or "reports".-Origin:The newspaper began as the News of the...
the participants were able to agree upon the fact that all of them want to live in an independent and democratic country.
In October 2006 the head institute of international welfare of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Russian Academy of Sciences
The Russian Academy of Sciences consists of the national academy of Russia and a network of scientific research institutes from across the Russian Federation as well as auxiliary scientific and social units like libraries, publishers and hospitals....
published an anthology of "The Conception and Identifying of Democracy". It used Fareed Zakaria's
Fareed Zakaria
Fareed Rafiq Zakaria is an Indian-American journalist and author. From 2000 to 2010, he was a columnist for Newsweek and editor of Newsweek International. In 2010 he became Editor-At-Large of Time magazine...
idea of the existence of a non-liberal democracy. The authors prove that throughout the history of western civilization, several democratic systems such as Aristocratic, Oligarchic, Egalitarian and National democracies replaced one another. Even more specific are the Chinese's ways of determining democracy. The democratic systems of the various countries of the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
also vary greatly, for example the French system is based primarily on the model of a strong national government.
Special interest is placed upon the theory of "Aristocratic Democracy" developed by the Italian historian de Ruggero. According to this theory, during the Middle Ages peasants had all of the rights of citizens and even maintained the right to elect monarchs. In western Europe there existed real aristocratic parliaments which were picked only by birth right. The vast majority of the population was looked upon as "unworthy" of receiving full citizen's rights. In this manner liberal democracy is only a try at adapting the norms of aristocratic democracy to the needs of the political system of today.
The current liberal democracy is one of the many variations of a democratic system. This kind of approach serves to advocate a scientific basis for the theory of Sovereign democracy.
In November 2007 a book entitled "Sovereign democracy in a Constitutionally-right-wing Dimension" was published by "Russian Newspaper". It presented itself as a compilation of the articles and materials of the leading jurists of the Russian Federation including Valery Zorkin
Valery Zorkin
Valery Dmitrievich Zorkin is the first and the current Chairman of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation.Zorkin was born on 18 February 1943 in a rural area of the Maritime Province. In 1964, he matriculated from the Law Department of the Moscow University, in which he lectured until...
and holds a constitutional basis for said concept.
See also
- Guided democracyGuided DemocracyGuided democracy, also called managed democracy, is a term for a democratic government with increased autocracy. Governments are legitimated by elections that, while free and fair, are used by the government to continue their same policies and goals...
- DemocracyDemocracyDemocracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...
- AuthoritarianismAuthoritarianismAuthoritarianism is a form of social organization characterized by submission to authority. It is usually opposed to individualism and democracy...
- Human rightsHuman rightsHuman rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
- SovereignSovereignA sovereign is the supreme lawmaking authority within its jurisdiction.Sovereign may also refer to:*Monarch, the sovereign of a monarchy*Sovereign Bank, banking institution in the United States*Sovereign...
Sources
- Project "Russia — Sovereign democracy", analytical portal.
- Sovereignty is a political synonym for the ability to compete, Vladislav Surkov, public speech, 7th of February 2006
- Nationalisation of the Future, Vladislav Surkov
- Our Russian model of democracy is called "Sovereign democracy", Vladislav Surkov, briefing, 28th of June 2006