The Russia Conundrum

Only by ditching the unaccountable autocracy of the few – the ‘inner state’ clique in the Kremlin – in favour of democratic institutions reflecting the will of the many can Russia hope to realise its full potential. Our previous attempts at democracy – the short period between the February and Bolshevik revolutions, the 1990s – were built on shaky foundations and were not a success. To succeed, a future Russia must build a firm democratic base, of the kind that has long been established in the West, with proper weight given to the voices of all electors and an effective separation of powers to bind the leadership into a system of checks and balances.

When I reflect on the years I have spent in the West since December 2013, when the Kremlin loaded me on to a German plane and sent me off into the unknown, I am struck by how much has changed in Russia. Back then, there was a move to restore relations with the West in advance of the Sochi Olympics. My release along with my friend and business partner, Platon Lebedev, as well as the women from Pussy Riot, was a gesture in this direction. When I first arrived in London, I felt there was a chance for gradual democratisation in my homeland; at that time, I didn’t see any pressing need for me to get involved in international politics.

But things started to change. First there was Ukraine’s Maidan revolution in February 2014, followed by the annexation of Crimea, the Kremlin’s intervention in Donbas, backing for Assad in Syria and finally the invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Putin doesn’t understand that people everywhere are motivated by a desire for liberty. That’s why he continues to parrot the old refrains, fulminating about ‘the machinations of the West’, ‘Russia surrounded by foreign enemies’ and ‘whoever is not with us is against us’.

I could no longer stand aside. In March 2014 I flew to Kiev and addressed the crowds on Maidan Square. I told them there is a different Russia from Putin’s Russia, a Russia that wishes you well, a Russia that sees its future together with yours, a common, European path of democracy. I took a plane to Donbas three days before the war broke out to bring the same message of hope. And I took the decision to intensify the work of my socio-political organisation, Open Russia.

Back then, it was still possible to engage openly in political activity, so I supported young candidates for the State Duma and municipal councils; I established several popular online publications; and I organised the ‘Enough!’ campaign against Putin’s cynical manoeuvring to extend his time in the presidency. We knew Putin wasn’t going to just throw in the towel, but there was still hope of managed change. This hope took a major blow in 2020, when Putin’s shameless rewriting of the constitution to perpetuate his own grip on power proved beyond doubt that Soviet totalitarianism was back. Now people started to be arbitrarily imprisoned simply for expressing their opinions, with the clear message to everyone else that they should think twice whether it was worth the risk. Those who didn’t get the message started to be labelled ‘foreign agents’, which means a de facto ban on working in many professions, or ‘members of undesirable organisations’, which means prison sentences, or – worst of all – ‘extremists’, for which the prison sentences are numbered in many years. As I mentioned, our own journalists and almost all our publications were declared ‘foreign agents’ and all our funds labelled ‘undesirable’.

Addressing the crowd on the Maidan in Kyiv, March 2014

The closure of our organisations and publications in Russia under the threat of Kremlin repression does not mean the end of the fight. We have found new ways of working, with editorial boards based abroad, journalists in Russia writing under pseudonyms, young political activists learning their trade via the internet and even some in-person training. We get much valuable help and information from democratically minded supporters who work in government jobs; human rights lawyers provide assistance to activists, journalists and bloggers seeking to defend themselves against state-sponsored persecution. Such methods alone will not lead to a change of power in Russia, but we have another much more ambitious target: when the current regime reaches its final, inevitable collapse – inevitable because of the weight of its own mistakes and the vulnerability of its ageing leader – we must ensure that Russia is not allowed to stumble into yet another era of authoritarian rule.