... Russia has had a functioning system for handing over power for only 121 years in its entire history: during the later years of the Romanov autocracy. Before Emperor Paul I established a legal structure in 1797, there was no law of succession: Czars simply chose their heirs. Both Peter the Great and Ivan the Terrible undermined their own achievements by killing their sons and chosen heirs. After Peter's death in 1725, the succession was decided through 70 years of palace coups and regicide, a system oft described by the witty phrase "autocracy tempered by assassination." Strong, intelligent empresses like Elizabeth and Catherine the Great seized power, creating an age of omnipotent petticoats. <...> There was no succession rule in the Soviet state, an empire ruled by a murderous clique, men who met in paranoid secrecy as if they were still scruffy conspirators plotting in a room above some provincial tavern. Sovereignty in this institutionalized conspiracy was meant to rest in the Central Committee, but actually five or six magnates decided everything. <...> Vladimir Putin wants his successes in Russia to be respected by the West; hence he did not simply ignore the Constitution and stay in the presidency. He and his grandees believe in the idiosyncratic style of authoritarian democracy that has restored Russianprestige (although his courtiers are also keen to preserve their power and wealth). <...> Russia is so feudal in its system of patronage and reward that it is virtually impossible for a leader to hand over power without controlling his successor or at least receiving an exemption from prosecution -- something Mr. Putin granted his predecessor, Boris Yeltsin, in 1999. Leaders, writes Professor Ra'anan, "are condemned to lead a Hobbesian existence, fearing the penalties that come with loss of power." <...> ... a drop in its oil revenues could lead to domestic unrest -- there is no other way to overthrow the oligarchy. Meanwhile, Mr. Putin's succession and (likely) restoration is a leisurely dance of the seven veils in which one veil is dropped only for another to be donned -- more fascinating even than the danse macabre of Soviet Kremlinology. But no one, probably not even the grandees of the Kremlin themselves, knows how it will end.
There was no succession rule in the Soviet state, an empire ruled by a murderous clique, men who met in paranoid secrecy as if they were still scruffy conspirators plotting in a room above some provincial tavern. Sovereignty in this institutionalized conspiracy was meant to rest in the Central Committee, but actually five or six magnates decided everything. <...>
Vladimir Putin wants his successes in Russia to be respected by the West; hence he did not simply ignore the Constitution and stay in the presidency. He and his grandees believe in the idiosyncratic style of authoritarian democracy that has restored Russianprestige (although his courtiers are also keen to preserve their power and wealth). <...>
Russia is so feudal in its system of patronage and reward that it is virtually impossible for a leader to hand over power without controlling his successor or at least receiving an exemption from prosecution -- something Mr. Putin granted his predecessor, Boris Yeltsin, in 1999. Leaders, writes Professor Ra'anan, "are condemned to lead a Hobbesian existence, fearing the penalties that come with loss of power." <...>
... a drop in its oil revenues could lead to domestic unrest -- there is no other way to overthrow the oligarchy. Meanwhile, Mr. Putin's succession and (likely) restoration is a leisurely dance of the seven veils in which one veil is dropped only for another to be donned -- more fascinating even than the danse macabre of Soviet Kremlinology. But no one, probably not even the grandees of the Kremlin themselves, knows how it will end.
