I think that Andrei Tsygankov's article on "American Russophobia" in The Moscow Times (republished on this website last week) is a rather useful illustration of how current US rhetoric on Russia can be perceived.
Yet, there are, at least, three additions that need to be made to Tsygankov's argument:
- US "anti-Russian" rhetoric is not that particular. One can hear similar voices in both Western and Eastern Europe. Tsygankov reproduces here a common Russian allegation that the West's current "anti-Russianness" is a sole result of Russia's recent "resurgence" as an international economic and political factor, or even a pathological reaction to Russia's purported "rebirth" as an independent nation under Putin. However, as Tsygankov should know, much of the more competent criticism of current Russia comes from people who not only know and study, but actually like or even love the Russian people, culture and customs - not to mention the various Russians and half-Russians among the critics.
- Russia herself has created much of - what one may call - the institutional background of Western criticism of her internal developments. She has entered the Council of Europe, and transformed the G7 into the G8. Russia is a prominent member of the OSCE, and engages with NATO in a special Council. The fundamental basis of all of these organizations are, however, those principles which Putin has violated repeatedly in recent years. Moreover, the Russian political elite is mocking Western values by making up concepts like "sovereign democracy" - based on half-democratic procedures, pseudo-pluralism, subverted checks and balances, a government-manipulated civil society, etc. If, as Tsygankov seems to think, "Russophobia" is the major problem in Russian-Western relations, then Russia should leave the above organizations. This would immediately cool down Western criticism of Russia.
- Certainly, Western criticism of Russia has become harsh recently, and is, I agree with Tsygankov, sometimes ridiculously incompetent. Yet, this still does not compare to what Russia's most influential political commentators today publicly opine about the United States and NATO, on a daily basis. Whoever knows Russian and had the chance to watch Russian TV for a couple of days may agree that Russian views on Western foreign policies, in general, and the US's role in the world, in particular, are nothing less than paranoid. The bizarre conspiracy theorizing that has taken hold of Russian public opinion nowadays goes far beyond Western "Russophobia". The West is not simply criticized, but demonized and made responsible for many of the mishaps of recent Russian or even world history. In its daily portrayal in Russian mass media, the US political elite comes across as a bunch of scoundrels whose every word on Western intentions in international affairs needs to be seen as a purposeful lie.
[The full version of this comment is attached below. It appeared earlier on Johnson's Russia List and OpEdNews.]
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May 29, 2008
Amarjyoti Acharya, independent scholar & writer, occasional painter of the skies!, Bronze Contributor (12)
1. What are the factors that lead to such prejudices on both the sides?
2. What are the agencies that profit the most by these exercises?
3. The nostalgia of the cold-war is still sought to be stoked. Though other challenges that are enough to take care of European Union's hard-won security and a zone of relative peace is not directly threatened by Russia. The US shall continue to lumber on as long as inertia does not wear it out to a standstill. Would the creation of phobias ensure its near-certain future. Every power goes through it and the generations that live during the apogee of such cycles usually end up transmitting memories that those living during the decline find hard to cope with and digest.
Would shrill phobias and paranoias be outcomes of the generation that happened to find itself 'come of age' during the journey down hill.
The Russian leadership does not seem to suffer from such pangs. Hard life ensures common sense and continued hardship when perceived to be unfairly imposed across the borders - well, the sentiments are understandable. One remembers Paul Kennedy's idea of the imperial overstretch. It is an interesting account and puts much of the European Enlightenment period's gains against the grain.
One would wait to watch and find out how the creators and manipulators of these opinion machines react when suddenly faced with China as a power with interesting ramifications. Suddenly is the word that best describes such 'scholarships' while it is obvious to many outside the ' flatter-your-keep' epistemic community. An interesting read of a situation by Umland that is self-explanatory.