Forecast
Russian President Vladimir Putin will face growing challenges from political elites, regional leaders and the general population.
Though Putin will capitulate to many Kremlin elites, he will also keep purging political opponents as necessary.
The new Duma leader, Vyacheslav Volodin, may use his increasing power to become yet another political figure defying Putin's authority.
Analysis
Russia's legislature may be the next theater of the power struggle that has rocked the Kremlin over the past three years. The Duma has been all but inconsequential during the 17 years that Russian President Vladimir Putin has been in power, serving mostly as a means to boost the leader's legitimacy and as a scapegoat for enacting tough reforms. Facing growing challenges from the Kremlin's political elite, Russia's regional leaders and the public at large, however, Putin has bestowed increasing authority on the legislature to push through the measures he needs to secure his rule. And a recent report from the Carnegie Moscow Center suggests that this power may have gone to the newly appointed parliamentary speaker's head.
Putin's Yes Men
Just after Putin took office as prime minister in 1999, his Unity Party came in second place to the Communist Party in parliamentary elections. The race was tight, and the Unity Party's strong performance helped catapult Putin to the presidency less than two weeks later. In 2004 during the next elections, the party — known by then as United Russia — secured control of the legislature. The victory gave Putin the mandate he needed to consolidate the country politically, economically, socially and across the security services. Ahead of the next elections in 2007, the Kremlin made sure that the vote would yield United Russia's strongest showing yet to legitimize Putin's choice to trade offices with Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev the following year. But the Kremlin's next attempt to manipulate elections in 2011-12, combined with Putin's decision to return to the presidency, met with backlash from the Russian people. Citizens took to the streets in the largest protests in Russia's post-Soviet history and eventually forced the Kremlin to cede to public dissent for the first time in Putin's tenure.
Nevertheless, Moscow resorted to electoral meddling again in the most recent parliamentary race in September 2016, albeit less overtly. The president needed a smooth transition free of significant protest or upheaval to start making drastic changes to his administration and to Russia's legal system. Though Putin still has high approval ratings, public discontent is spreading over worsening economic conditions and a perceived over-politicization in the country's day-to-day affairs. Meanwhile, Putin has become increasingly concerned about challenges to his authority. Consequently, the Kremlin is taking measures to prevent instability, crack down on dissent and clean house in the government's upper echelons.
Creating a Monster
But Putin needed a strong and loyal leader at the head of the Duma to usher these changes through the legislature. To that end, he appointed his former deputy chief of staff, Vyacheslav Volodin, as Duma speaker. Volodin is known for adeptly managing difficult political situations. In fact, Putin brought him in as deputy prime minister in 2012 to calm the maelstrom that the rigged parliamentary vote and mass protests had created. Volodin has long striven to break into the top ranks of the Kremlin elite, but he has never had the power to do so. And under normal circumstances, the speakership wouldn't get him any closer to that goal. But with Putin's drive to pass the legislation he needs to further bolster his authority, Volodin's position has taken on greater importance.
Now, Volodin is taking steps to further shore up his own power in the legislature. The speaker has consolidated procedural rules and legislation under his sole authority, according to the Carnegie Center. In addition, the report claims that he has positioned himself as an intermediary between government officials and lawmakers, giving him the power to block dialogue or scuttle proposals as he sees fit.
Another Challenger?
The speaker's actions are following a pattern that has become all too familiar for Putin. Over the past few years, the Kremlin's most powerful figures have been jockeying for position, often in defiance of the president. In late 2016, for instance, Rosneft chief Igor Sechin went behind Putin's back to acquire a controlling stake in rival oil firm Bashneft. He also ignored Putin's orders to sell shares of his company to a list of approved buyers and instead sold them to partners of his own choosing. Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov took to social media to criticize the Finance Ministry's initiative to cut federal subsidies to his region, hinting that war-torn Chechnya could destabilize without the proper funding. And Sergey Chemezov, head of state defense giant Rostec, has been busy purchasing various defense enterprises to ensure that his firm has infiltrated every arm of Russia's military-industrial complex — an action that in the past Putin has tried to prevent. (Chemezov also snatched up some of Russia's largest untapped gold deposits after outbidding state bank VTB in an 11-minute auction in January, adding to his tremendous wealth.)
These maneuvers, though doubtless bothersome for the Russian president, are hardly unexpected. After all, Sechin, Kadyrov and Chemezov are among the most powerful figures in Russia, and for nearly two decades, they have been stabilizing forces for the Kremlin, even if they sometimes flout Putin's orders. But then, second- and third-tier political leaders in Russia began to deviate from the Kremlin's line. Leaders of regional governments, many saddled with federal debt that they have already defaulted on or are about to default on, are expressing their dissent with increasing force and frequency. A growing number of them, moreover, have eliminated the local government structures beneath them to ensure their hold on power. To manage the upheaval, Putin has dismissed six regional leaders in the past three weeks, and on Feb. 17, he held a Security Council meeting to try to assuage fears of a widespread purge across regional governments.
Though Volodin is one of Putin's loyalists, he may well go rogue once he has amassed enough power, as so many other members of Russia's political elite have. For the president, this could be disastrous. The last thing Putin needs is another heavyweight rival, particularly as the challenges to his authority continue to mount. Putin has already begun transforming his office into a more heavy-handed autocratic position, but he still needs loyalists to implement his strategy rather than focusing on their own paths to power.
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