Tom Balmforth

RussiaProfile.org

President Dmitry Medvedev issued another call for modernisation in his state-of-the-nation address, but critics said the speech lacked practical substance.    

Medvedev promised to set forth "concrete plans" for carrying out Russia's modernisation strategy, expanding on his "Forward, Russia" article in September, which offered a stark appraisal of the problems facing the country. The president once again underlined the need for profound structural change based on the "institutions of democracy," and did in fact promise some modest political reforms.

The president was frank in stressing the need for Russia to evolve from the Soviet model, and insisted that Russia could not blame external factors for the economic crisis that hit it so badly.

"We have not yet managed to get rid of the primitive structure of our economy. ... The competitiveness of production here is shamefully low," he said. "Instead of a primitive economy based on raw materials, we will create a smart economy, producing unique knowledge, new goods and technologies which are of use to people."

"All we got was more rhetoric, frankly," said Chris Weafer, chief strategist at Uralsib. "I think it was more a restatement of what he said ... in September, again highlighting the problems the economy is facing and the overdependency on oil and gas. ... But from an investment point of view it was a disappointment that there were not more specifics, that there were not more details of what the government was going to do, which is actually what we were hoping to hear. That didn't come."

But Sergei Markov, a United Russia State Duma deputy, said the speech demonstrated that Russia was stepping into a new phase of development. "Medvedev confirmed Russia's pursuit of the path toward modernisation," said Markov. "Today showed the transition to the next phase in the development of the country. The first phase was the 1990s and gaining freedom; the 2000s was the gaining of state stability; and now - that is to say, the 2010s - we are entering the phase of modernization."

Medvedev did make some political pledges, however. He proposed to relax party registration laws to make the electoral process more transparent, including scrapping the minimum number of signatures required for registration for parliamentary polls. Allegations of fraud and a lack of transparency in October's regional elections prompted the Communists, the ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party and the Just Russia party to stage a brief walkout from the State Duma in October.

Vladimir Zhirinovsky, leader of the Liberal Democrats, was pleased by the proposed reforms, smiling broadly during the ovation that followed Medvedev's proposals.

The president was careful to couple these proposals for political reform with a warning to the opposition that they should not "destabilise the state and split society" in the name of democracy - a reference to the Duma walkout.

Medvedev originally suggested reducing the number of signatures required by a party to register for elections in his annual address last year, and the reform was later adopted.

But today's proposals represent a much deeper change to current electoral legislation, and the implementation of last year's promises does not guarantee success this time around, said Alexei Mukhin, director of the Moscow-based Centre for Political Information.

"Medvedev made a lot of bold statements that would destabilise the political situation and change it. But, as we know, the present system is suited to the needs of United Russia. And United Russia has shown itself to be an effective lobbyist, skilfully blocking practically all initiatives directed at changing the election legislation. Therefore Dmitry Medvedev will now be confronted with the problem of implementing what he defined as his political initiatives," Mukhin said.

Liberals who had hoped that Medvedev might steer Russia away from Putin's power vertical are still waiting for evidence of practical democratic reforms. Mukhin said he was unsure that Medvedev's electoral reforms would ever see the light of day. "To free parties from collecting signatures before elections and making campaigning easier is possible in principle, of course, but I think that in this situation United Russia will try to somewhat limit the president's initiatives," he said.

Forbes magazine was also sceptical of Medvedev's ability to deliver on his promises. It ranked Putin the third most powerful person in the world, while Medvedev was ranked 43, one place behind Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin.