Has Russia’s best chance of revival died, with Navalny?
The death of the champion of human rights and democracy may have doomed Russia to further authoritarianism under an increasingly dictatorial President Vladimir Putin. By
Alexei Navalny, who died on 16 February, was a tireless, fearless – perhaps even personally reckless – advocate for human rights and democratic values in Russia. He was just 47 years old, and at the time of his death he was a “resident” of a work camp in a prison colony north of the Arctic Circle.
The government had previously tried to poison Navalny, and he had been arrested and imprisoned repeatedly. His final days in this camp were probably the worst of any experience he had previously endured.
Official acknowledgement of his death said he had been out on a walk and unexpectedly fell ill from a blood clot in the brain. But can anyone recall hearing of someone going for a leisurely stroll in the Arctic tundra in mid-winter in February?
Rather, conjure up the scene in the film Dr Zhivago, where the unlucky couple are hiding out in that frozen dacha, in the middle of a blizzard, with the hungry wolves circling, howling into the Arctic winter? And that was the weather for Navalny’s stroll?
Other than an outside evaluation, we shall probably never know for sure what happened, unless the remains are suddenly released and independent experts examine them. Don’t count on that, though.
Nevertheless, his widow has already spoken publicly about continuing her husband’s efforts, in remarks at the Munich Security Conference that was occurring even as Navalny’s death was announced. Meanwhile, in Russia itself, supporters have been leaving messages and flowers in his memory.
In a crude effort to rewrite history and quickly expunge the memory of Navalny, or, at the minimum, to tamp down support for his vision, the police have been taking into custody those making these signs of respect for doing such horrific, treasonous acts such as leaving flowers in his memory.
Nevertheless, Navalny’s crusade for democratic accountability and against the rampant corruption in the Russian state has not yet entirely withered, even if its leading advocate has perished. How it will play out in future is, of course, unknown.
One long-time observer of Russian society told Daily Maverick: “Going forward may be hard to measure until we see how Russians react. Most now just feel crushed, with all hope lost once again. Many reformers since 1917 have tried and failed. The best way to end Putinism is with a Kremlin defeat in Ukraine.”
But let’s think about the future impact of Navalny a bit further. Can we say at this early moment that his crusade has achieved nothing? Will he join the roster of other reformers in Russian and Soviet history, or will there be something more?
Consider Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin, the third prime minister (and interior minister) of the czarist empire under the country’s new constitution, from 1906 until his assassination in 1911. Known as the greatest reformer of Russian society and economy, his reforms led to unprecedented economic
growth in the Russian state, but it came to a halt after his assassination.
Inept repression followed, and his legacy was overwhelmed by Russia’s disastrous entry in World War 1, a subsequent civil war and then, finally, the imposition of Lenin’s, then Stalin’s authoritarian rule, including the massive famine in Ukraine, the purges and the Gulag.
Or consider the fate of Mikhail Gorbachev. In contrast to the sclerotic party figures who had come before him, Gorbachev had tried to lead the Soviet Union away from the failed leadership in the years following Nikita Khrushchev’s time in office, only for Gorbachev to live to see his reforms and the
opening up of the economy end in the collapse of the Soviet Union – with the help of a failed military coup.
In those chaotic years, the new opportunities brought about the rise of the oligarchs, new corruption, Gorbachev’s replacement by Boris Yeltsin and then, ultimately, the rise of Vladimir Putin.
Looking ahead, Russia has a national election soon, but Putin’s party – and thus the incumbent president himself – is virtually certain to win, yet again. Any potential alternatives have been rendered ineligible to run for office, leaving one to wonder why they even bother to go through with an election if we already know who is going to win.
If Navalny had lived, and even more so, if he had been free to move around the country, he would almost certainly have been declared ineligible to run for office.
But what he might have been able to do, however, would have been to carry out a “campaign” about the iniquities of a rigged election, the deep flaws in the personality and policies of the certain winner – and, especially, the thorough degrading of any democratic processes, the acceleration of high-level corruption, and the further collapse of the strength of civil society, a free media and open, transparent governance.
And he most likely would have captured attention among a much larger segment of the public, given his skills in exploiting social media and the use of whatever free media remains. Navalny would have hammered away, metaphorically, at the emperor’s appalling wardrobe choices.
One crucial element that must still be remembered is that Navalny, at his death, was only 47 years old. In the future, he would have represented a generation that came of age after the fall of communism, with a population that had increasingly embraced the possibilities of new communications tools and connections to the wider world.
In this, he would have been in sync with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, along with other politicians across Europe who have come of age since the collapse of communism. Navalny would have found a natural ally in Zelensky, in addition to support and encouragement from others in many Western countries.
In such an alternative universe, there might even have been growing public pressure to bring the brutal, costly war in Ukraine to an end. But now, such pressures will have to come from elsewhere.
Alive, there could have been decades of Navalny’s impact and presence on the Russian political and social landscape.
Consider what might have happened in South Africa had Nelson Mandela been subjected to medical mistreatment or a failure to receive care? Or even, perhaps, to have had his life brought to a premature end by the judicial system, or by police and prison officials’ action? If he had died in prison in the mid-1960s, his passing might have caused just a small ripple in South Africa’s political life since it would already have been years since he had been seen in public.
Of course, the apartheid South African government eventually came to the realisation that, rather than treating Mandela as a dangerous challenge, it needed him to achieve a settlement. This was the case even while he was in prison – Mandela’s presence was crucial if the old regime were to find a way forward with their antagonists among the liberation camp.
Russia’s dilemma now is that Navalny could have been an effective channel for bringing the aspirations of many – especially among younger generations – into a real conversation about the future shape of Russia, even if the risk was that Navalny might well have rivalled any sitting government in popularity. But we shall never know.
Perhaps a parallel for his death is with the killing of Steve Biko, still a young man when his treatment by the police in bringing him from the Eastern Cape to Pretoria effectively became his execution. His passing ultimately made it that much harder for the black consciousness movement to continue as a cohesive political movement. Though his intellectual impact has been very real, his political impact not so much.
Sadly, Russia will never have Navalny’s drive to lead to a return to sanity in Russia. But his spirit may.
Alive, there could have been decades of Alexei Navalny’s impact and presence on the Russian political and social
landscape