Much debate has surrounded the rise of authoritarianism across the globe. Be it the election of right-wing extremist Narendra Modi as the Prime Minister of India in 2014, the election of Donald J. Trump as the 45^th president of the United States of America in 2016, or the rise of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Turkey. All these leaders have one thing in common: they have used divisive approaches to maintain their favorability in public. And it has worked. Globalization has dwindled against the protectionist attitudes of the right-wing extremist powers.

On top of this chain of authoritarianism stands Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. Since his election to power, Putin has perpetuated a divisive rhetoric that has swept Russia and many other global powers. But why the need for divisive regional or international politics? Because using the ‘us vs. them’ approach as a tool stands unmatched in deviating public attention from genuine economic grievances. The lack of sustainable domestic economic development is overshadowed by the ‘us vs. them’ paradigm that countries like Russia and USA, India and Pakistan, etc., have engaged in.

Similar trends can be found in the Middle East, North Korea, and many other countries that keep their populations quiet by using the ‘they are out to get us’ card. Behind the facade of Russia’s international might, we can see a country failing and still recovering from the fall of the Soviet Union — the utopia that Putin tries to sell even today. The Russian electorate is controlled through an ironclad rule and sold nostalgia and international perceived threats (read USA) to curb the Russian populace’s frustration. 

Let’s look deeper into the depreciating economic condition of Russia and the rise of the divisive agenda in Russian politics to hide all that is wrong with the present-day Russian Federation.

“One who does not regret the passing of the Soviet Union has no heart; one who wants to bring it back has no brain,” Putin once — said in an Interview with German television channel ARD and ZDF in May 2005. The quote symbolizes everything that Putin stands for. A man of the 90s, Putin belongs to the bygone era of the Soviet Union, a former KGB spy with a reputation for crushing any resistance with any means necessary. Fast forward to today, and we see not much has changed. The economy remains in tatters, and Putin maintains the same rhetoric.

While he has never shied away from exploiting soviet nostalgia, Putin has often claimed that those days were different than today’s times. Yet when the president of the Russian Federation says that those who don’t regret the fall of the Soviet Union have no heart, he is anchoring the public to that nostalgia — a card he plays a lot. And, of course, when this card doesn’t play out, Putin focuses his rhetoric on America, a country with Russia that has had an on-and-off relationship since world war I. In addition to the US, Putin blames hostile western powers for condemning Russia’s poor economic growth.

Take, for instance, this statement made by Putin in 2013: “Nobody should have any illusion about the possibility of gaining military superiority over Russia. We will never allow this to happen. Russia will respond to all these challenges, political and military.” This was Putin trying to reinforce the idea that Russia is the world’s greatest military strength. As a leader of tremendous wit, Putin doesn’t shy away from indirectly warning the western powers of Russia’s military might. Putin uses his rhetoric to deviate the Russian people from the adverse effects of international economic sanctions by the US and its western allies.

Deployments in Crimea and Syria serve as a reminder of Russia’s growing control in the international arena. But truth be told, both the United States and Russia have used ‘National Security’ and ‘Human Rights Violations’ to meddle in the affairs of other countries. In Russia, deployment in Crimea was justified as an approach to curb rising fascist movements and military intervention in Syria to curb rising Islamic extremism. President Obama accurately put it when he said Russia’s economy “doesn’t produce anything that anybody wants to buy, except oil, gas, and arms.” 

However, there is another power dynamic at play here. Putin has seized strongholds in international waters and countries slowly and steadily. In an article for The Atlantic, Edward Delman explained how Russia’s intervention in Ukraine and Syria allowed it to seize control of essential ports by establishing naval bases in Tartus and Sevastopol. With control over Tartus, Russia launched a strong presence in the Mediterranean.

By gaining a solid presence on the high seas, Russia gains more and more space in international waters. In Sevastopol alone, Russia’s naval presence was a substantial 15,000 maritime personnel. An article in New York Times argued that by seizing Crimea, Russia took a “maritime zone more than three times its size with the rights to underwater resources potentially worth trillions of dollars.”

Military might is important to Putin, as it makes it possible to sell the ‘strong leader persona’ to the Russian populace during a time when increasing protests against the Government by a pro-Europe population threaten his unchallenged regime. More interestingly, Putin’s interest in the middle-east has many facets of motives. The war in Syria allows Russia to sell arms and display and test its military strength — a message to the world that Russia is a global power with strong military might. In theory, Russia, one of the largest exporters of arms to countries like India and even a superpower like China, through the Syrian civil war, has displayed the might of its weapons, an opportunity it wouldn’t have otherwise secured.

Richard Reeve, director of the Sustainable Security Programme at the Oxford Research Group, said that by intervening in Syria, Putin has access to a battleground where he “gives the military real war experience — for their confidence — and it sends a message to the rest of the world that Russia is a capable, modern military player. Also, it shows those weapons in action to potential customers.”

He further adds that any negotiation to end the conflict couldn’t be without involving Russia in it. Clearly, there is a power dynamic at play here where Putin has managed to become one of the most influential personalities in modern times, a fact corroborated by the fact that many experts believed that Time’s Person of the Year in 2016 should have been Putin rather than Donald Trump. 

There is also a growing concern and evidence of Russian interference in America’s past elections and the upcoming election processes of other countries. A pattern of cyber-attacks and money laundering supporting Putin’s favored parties threatens the democratic fundamentals of electoral processes. From Ukraine, Estonia, Germany, Austria, France, and Bulgaria to the mighty United States, there is a trail of Russian interference in internal matters of western countries — places where Putin doesn’t have any locus standi. Let’s take a look at the evidence.

Oren Dorell, in an article for USA Today, connects the dots. Starting with Estonia, hackers shut down the internet in 2007 in response to the removal of the Soviet World War II memorial from central Tallinn. The IP addresses were traced to be Russian. In Ukraine, a pro hackers group, CyberBerkut, attacked the Election commission website attempting to fake voting results. In addition, Ukrainian officials in 2015 accused Russia of a power grid attack.

In Germany, similar patterns of hacking computers of the Lower house of parliament by Russian hackers were observed. Oren quotes BFV chief Hans-Georg Maasen, who accused Moscow of manipulating public opinion through fake news propaganda. In Bulgaria, the same hackers hacked local elections in 2015. France and Poland also based similar cyber-attacks traced back to pro-Russian hackers’ groups. 

Even so, Moscow’s alleged reach was not limited to just cyber-attacks. Vast sums of money were also laundered from Russia to banks in the UK. In an article for The Guardian, Luke Harding, Nick Hopkins, and Caelainn Barr provide insights into how vast sums of money were laundered into offshore accounts — a trail that led to 96 countries. The article reveals that big banks like HSBC, the Royal Bank of Scotland, and Barclays were among 17 UK-based banks that had links with the Russian Government. From 2010 to 2014, $20 to $80 billion was laundered out of Russia.

Among 70,000 banking transactions, 373 were from US banks, the article claimed. So what does this mean? Many experts claim that the money was used to further Russia’s interests in other states. How much of this accusation is true is debatable, but it showcases Russia’s reach into central corporate banks — all this evidence forecasts ominous portents.

Moscow may have dominated the global scene, but a look inside the domestic condition in Russia reveals an eerie reality: a lack of sustainable economic development and a growing percentage of the population that has started raising its voice against a dictatorship that hides behind a democratic facade. All this while, Putin has reinforced his image of being a strong dynamic global leader with high approval ratings that sustain his politics of fear and power.

Coupled with Russia’s growing influence in the electoral process in the west, Putin has proven to his people that democratic freedom is overrated and that other countries are faring worse than Russia is. But as time progresses, Russia’s internal issues and deteriorating health will inevitably challenge the former KGB spy. A stark contrast is revealed when we look at Russia as an increasing global power at a time when its economy has a free fall. Russia’s greatest challenge is domestic. Putin, so far, has played it smart by deviating all attention to international matters. Still, the ground beneath Moscow is sliding and only forecasts the inevitable decline of the oil-dependent economy that Moscow has become. Let’s look at the problems that Russia’s economy faces domestically and internationally.

Perhaps one of Russia’s biggest worries today is the increasing poverty rate. With an unprecedented decline in household incomes, Russia faces alarming poverty levels. With businesses cutting wages and increasing their profits, the Russian labor force suffers amidst a lack of influential trade unions. The economy, put, is not functioning as a consumer-based economy. To put things in perspective, by the end of 2015, purchasing power had decreased by 10%, worse than in 1998 or 2009. Company profits during the same time increased to 49% compared to a 4.6% increase in nominal wages. The number of Russians with incomes below the subsistence level amounted to 19.6 million people or 13.3% in January-September 2020.

With decreasing purchasing power and no proper mechanism to distribute wealth, the future looks stark, even if the GDP is forecasted to grow after years of recession. As of 2017, only ten were financially stable among the 85 official regions that Russia is split into. As poverty increases, a trust deficit emerges between people and the Government. Even though its favorability ratings (which many believe to be rigged) of Putin have remained around 60-65% through the years, things can change if the Kremlin doesn’t address the growing fundamental concerns of the masses.

Many believe that the social fabric of Russia is deteriorating, which is terrible for any functioning economy. In an interview with Forbes, Frances Hudson said, “The number of professionals seeking to leave Russia exceeds 50% in certain segments. This reduces the creative potential to support economic development in the country, accentuates capital flight, and reduces domestic consumption. The same conditions also affect the country’s ability to attract foreign talent, which could play an additional role in the next stage of developing the Russian economy.” This is an alarming sign, especially when such a large number of people want to leave Russia.

It’s known that Moscow has continuously operated like a lesser democracy, with limited press freedom and rights, almost resembling an autocratic rule. Before, the people were okay with such an ironclad rule because of the promise of increasing wages and prosperity. Still, tensions seem to rise as a growing population opposes Putin’s government. Suppose Russia doesn’t revamp its domestic economic policies with measures to elicit proper distribution of wealth and intelligent use of taxes. In that case, chances are the social fabric will continue to decay, leaving the Russian Federation in troubled waters.

The most significant cause of the decaying social fabric and decline in real wages is inflation. The primary driver for high inflation is the free-floating exchange rate policy that the Russian Central Bank adopted in 2014. As a result, the Government no longer protects the rubble against depreciation, making the Ruble dependent on the Market. However some economists think it will have positive effects, but the expected gains have not yet manifested. As of May 2021, one Russian Ruble is equivalent to 0.014 US dollars, down from 0.017 in 2017. The good news, though, is inflation has decreased from 5.38% in 2016 to 4.91% in 2020. Nonetheless, there is still a long way to go before the inflation rate can fall below 4%. 

High rates of inflation, coupled with poor management of the distribution of wealth, have led to a decrease in purchasing power for the public and private sectors. On the outside, it may seem that low comparative inflation has led to leeway for economic growth. However, the country still has a long way to economic recovery, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic.

The most significant contributor to economic inconsistency has been Russia’s dependency on oil and other non-renewable sources of energy. Russia receives 60% of its income from exporting oil and natural gas. This is problematic, considering many countries are increasingly opting for clean, renewable energy sources. If Russia sustains its economy in the long run, it will have to divest its dependency on oil to other production sources. 

Suppose Moscow wants to maintain its positive GDP growth. In that case, it will have to find a way around these problems through sophisticated economic reforms in the domestic sector, which increase the private sector’s purchasing power and keep inflation in check. But instead of focusing on policy reforms to boost capital expenditure or consumption, Putin has only tried to consolidate his regime further, focusing attention on international affairs through shows of power, rhetoric, and state-owned media to keep his authoritarian regime alive. 

The economy, though, is not the only concern facing Moscow right now. From what appears, there is a power struggle inside Russia between the Federal and Regional governments. Add to that increasing levels of corruption, and Russia is looking at political instability. With a humongous 84 regions to govern, the Kremlin has granted substantial autonomy to the regions. With ridiculous debt-to-revenue ratios of over 85% of more than 25 Russian regions, there seems to be no other way for parts but to borrow more and more money from the Federal Government.

And on the other side, Kremlin’s demand for debt repayment has not stopped leading to more borrowing from Regions to pay the debt. With many regions having stopped payment of a debt, there seems to exist a sense of disregard shown to the Federal Government’s power by the regional governments amid growing frustrations of debt and rise in poverty. Besides economic grievances with the regions, the Federal Government also has political grievances with the regional leaders, many of whom were also arrested by the Putin administration.

Russia also faces problems with its agricultural sector. With only 30% of its territory falling in favorable weather conditions, most of the country offers an unfavorable environment for the agriculture sector. The Agricultural industry cannot compete with the European market due to a lack of total factor productivity in the labor sector and a shortage of machinery. To improve its agricultural production, Russia needs to aggressively invest in new technology and upgrade its machinery, besides investing in the education of the labor force to increase the total factor productivity.

Yet, of all the threats Putin faces, one deserves a special mention: the pro-democracy protests that have swept Russia since 2017, led by Alexei Navalny, a Russian opposition leader, politician, lawyer, and anti-corruption activist. Navalny became international prominence by organizing anti-government demonstrations and running for office to advocate reforms against corruption in Russia. The 44-year-old has millions of Russian followers on social media and shot to fame when his blogs began exposing Russian government corruption in the late 2000s.

In December 2016, the opposition leader announced the formal start of his campaign to run for the Russian presidency in March 2018. However, he was barred from running for the post after multiple allegations of corruption were leveled against him.

Navalny’s campaign against Putin resulted in him getting arrested multiple times and surviving numerous assassination attempts. In 2018, Navalny was attacked with a bright green liquid in the Siberian city of Barnaul by an assailant who pretended to shake his hand. In 2019 he suffered an allergic reaction in jail, allegedly from an unknown chemical substance. On August 20, 2020, Navalny’s spokesperson announced that after drinking tea in an airport, the activist became violently ill during a flight. The plane made an emergency landing, and he was rushed to a hospital in Germany.

Navalny accused Putin of being responsible for his poisoning, and an investigation implicated agents from the Federal Security Service (FSB) in his poisoning. Later, the German Government said labs in France and Sweden confirmed that Navalny had been poisoned with the Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok. The EU and UK responded by imposing sanctions on Russian officials. In response, Mr. Putin denied that he was behind the near-deadly poisoning of his most prominent political opponent, telling journalists with a laugh that if Russian agents had wanted to kill Mr. Navalny, “they would have probably finished the job.”

On 17 January 2021, when Navalny returned to Russia, he was immediately detained for violating parole conditions. On 2 February, Navalny was sentenced to prison, where he will have to spend over two and half years in a corrective labor colony. Following his arrest and the release of the documentary Putin’s Palace (by Navalny), which accused Putin of corruption, mass protests across the country were held. The YouTube video narrated by Navalny, titled “Putin’s Palace,” got over 100 million hits and kicked off a nationwide movement against Putin. Many consider these protests across Russian cities the most widespread challenge yet to Putin’s power. The protests have already led to 11,000 detentions. Russia even ended up expelling diplomats from Sweden, Germany, and Poland for participating in ‘illegal’ protests against the jailing of Alexei Navalny. 

Today, Russia is approaching a tipping point that can only be delayed but not evaded by the Kremlin’s high-handedness. Sooner or later, the political reality of the Russian Federation is bound to change. If history teaches us anything, no nation can win a war against its people. The COVID-19 pandemic and the accompanying global recession have only catalyzed the already volatile Russian economy, with Russians staring at a decline in real disposable income, rising unemployment, falling wages, political instability, EU sanctions, and the constant rise of authoritarianism are all challenges Russia is facing today.

From economy to foreign policy, the Kremlin must tread carefully, or it risks destabilization, whose ripples will be felt in all the places where Russia has a military presence. After the amendments of 2020, Putin can stay in power for another two terms until 2036. Still, his credibility as a leader will only face more regional and global opposition as time progresses. Meanwhile, the Russian populace faces the greatest threats to their liberties due to rising crackdowns on freedom of speech and freedom of the press by the Government.

Whether the propaganda machine can quell the new wave of mass protests remains to be seen. One thing is for sure, a tipping point doesn’t seem far away for the Russian Federation, especially now that the US has a new government that will no longer turn a blind eye towards the excesses of the Kremlin.