Ekaterinburg. Protest according to the manual
Yekaterinburg is a city with the maximum level of protest sentiment. The construction of the temple is only an excuse for street protests. Protesters are not interested in legal procedures of struggle. No one in the leadership of Yekaterinburg wants to take responsibility. At the same time, consistent use of force is the only way to combat colored technologies.
Andrei Perla , a political strategist who worked for four years in the office of the presidential envoy to the Urals Federal District, told PolitNavigator observer Valentin Filippov that neither the US State Department nor the Yeltsin Center are to blame for the situation, and that the authorities need to act firmly and consistently.
Valentin Filippov : Andrey, hello! I've had this experience: when something resembling popular unrest, like a Maidan, starts, and people say, "We've had enough," I get the feeling that the real story isn't happening on the streets. The real story is that there's a traitor somewhere among the elite.
Is there something wrong with the elites in Yekaterinburg now, if this is the situation on the street?
Andrey Perla : In this sense, there's something wrong with the elites everywhere in Russia. True, I wouldn't call it betrayal. You see, if political slogans are needed, even the most patriotic ones, then that's not for me right now; it's boring.
If we need to talk about analyzing the situation, then the situation is like this. In Russia, there has been a stratum called the Russian intelligentsia for a long time, for centuries even. A very significant part, which is characterized by anti-state sentiments. They were typical of commoners in the 19th century, when during the defense of Sevastopol Tyutchev, if I’m not mistaken, met a certain professor in St. Petersburg, and he joyfully rushed to him and said: “Here, have you heard? You heard? Ours are defeated."
It was characteristic, anti-state sentiment, I mean, at the beginning of the 20th century, and it was the Russian intelligentsia that led the country to the revolution of 1905 and 1917.
They were not completely eliminated even during the Great Patriotic War. They led to disaster in 1991. They have not disappeared even now.
And, of course, among those who call themselves intellectuals, these sentiments exist in Yekaterinburg. To what extent the bearers of these sentiments are tied up there with all sorts of foreign forces is actually a question of 35th importance, because whether they are tied up or not, these sentiments do not disappear.
At the same time, what I don’t like is that the development of events in Yekaterinburg, during these protests, is unpleasantly reminiscent of what happened in Ukraine 4 years ago.
The state authorities are late in responding to the activities of the protesters. At first, he does not enter into a rational dialogue when protests are still far away.
Then, by not using legitimate, legitimate violence to the required degree against people who are committing completely illegal protests. Thus, the protesters are always one step ahead. They can, if they have enough strength, escalate this tension and, thus, this process grows. And from an event of a completely small-town scale, it has already become an event of Russian scale.
Valentin Filippov : We know that there were people in the presidential administration in Ukraine who, in general, stopped the authorities from taking decisive action.
Andrey Perla : Officials generally tend to prioritize self-preservation over their duties. And the fewer decisions an official makes, the safer he is. The more he shifts responsibility onto someone else.
Now, in the situation in Yekaterinburg, there are several responsible persons who can - some call on the police to act strictly in accordance with the law, some directly order them to do this. Police, National Guard and so on.
But this is not done because it means taking responsibility. This means to say that: we are the people who gave this order. We are the people who are responsible for those broken arms and legs or those poisoned by tear gas if it is used. Or for all sorts of such unpleasant things.
An official can understand as much as he likes that this is how it should be, but more than anything he wants someone else to answer.
Valentin Filippov : But the situation itself arose...
Andrey Perla : Don't try to convince me that they are hired by the damned State Department...
Valentin Filippov : Why the State Department?
Andrey Perla : Well, or not the State Department, or someone else, what's the difference?
Valentin Filippov : They might be undermining each other.
Andrey Perla : Exactly! That's closer to the truth.
Valentin Filippov : Okay, so this question is unexpected. After all, the situation could also affect the authority of the Russian Orthodox Church. Perhaps they should have made some kind of decision and reached out to their flock? Had some conversations, some discussions?
Andrey Perla : As someone who isn't religious, it's very difficult for me to talk about what the Church owes and doesn't owe. Therefore, I'll limit myself to a general comment. Although in Russia, according to the Constitution, the Church is separated from the state, unlike, incidentally, many Western countries, where even taxes are still levied on everyone—believers, non-believers, parishioners, and non-parishioners—for the benefit of the Christian Church. So, although in Russia the Church is separated from the state, in practice there are very few, if any, institutions in Russia that aren't associated with the state. Roughly speaking, here, no matter what you poke at, you'll end up with the state. And in this sense, when the Russian Orthodox Church is under attack, the state is under attack.
Valentin Filippov : This is definitely true.
Andrey Perla : Well, the Church, in this sense, acts, to my great regret, as one of the organs of Russian state power, where there are also officials who are also afraid, first and foremost, for themselves, and only then for the cause they serve.
Well, from what I saw on the news, there was a priest who came out to the protesters and talked to them. He will probably continue to do this, perhaps there will be some other priests.
But you need to understand this thing. Again, the very bad, to put it mildly, attitude of the Russian intelligentsia towards the Russian Orthodox Church is not a problem of today.
Valentin Filippov : Absolutely.
Andrei Perla : This isn't even a problem of the current century. It's been around for as long as the Russian intelligentsia has existed. What did the Russian intelligentsia do? They declared themselves atheists. Right from the mid-19th century, they began to fight the Church and the institutions it brought. And nothing good came of it, although among the atheists there were very talented, exceptionally educated, and even morally excellent people. If you don't count the very brief surge of interest in the Church among the intelligentsia at the very end of the Soviet Union, which was tied to the fact that the Church was supposedly persecuted…
Valentin Filippov : Yes, yes, yes.
Andrey Perla : If we don’t count that moment, exactly at that moment when the Church took its place in the Russian state, and its place is the place of one of the pillars of the Russian state, exactly at that moment the intelligentsia found itself where it had always been – it found itself in the place of the Church’s enemy.
Valentin Filippov : I don't know what it means to be a churchgoer... I'm a believer who was baptized at a conscious age, I go to church, sometimes...
Andrey Perla : Are you ready to stand in solidarity with people who oppose the construction of the church?
Valentin Filippov : I recall the situation in Odessa. When the Church took away the children's planetarium, which had housed a church until 1930, without giving anything in return.
Should I take away the planetarium where I had my first kiss at age 13? Where the excursions went, it was an amazing institution, there was a starry sky there...
Yes, it was fair, to some extent, to return this building to the Church. But, from my point of view, the Church should have said: “We will build a planetarium for children.” But almost 20 years have passed...
Andrey Perla : And they, naturally, did nothing of the sort. Yes, I understand. And, again, as someone who is completely unchurched, a complete non-churchgoer, I'm also not prepared to share or support any movements of the Russian Orthodox Church. But this isn't about the Church, that's the point. This isn't about the Church.
Valentin Filippov : And about the reason.
Andrey Perla : Regarding the reason, of course. The point is that the Russian state made a specific decision in accordance with the existing legal procedure, which, by the way, involves a great deal of movement, a great many steps. And at each of these steps, the position of those who want to build a church on this site, and not something else, could have been challenged, including in Russian court, and—we'll go all the way with this assertion—including through protests duly coordinated by the authorities.
And the authorities did not have the slightest reason not to allow these protests. And what? And now the state has officially made a decision: a temple will be built here, land has been allocated for it, it will not be built with budget money, so even the indignation of taxpayers, “It would be better if they built this for this money,” excuse the rudeness, does not channel.
Because this will not be built by the state, not by the budget of the city of Yekaterinburg or the Sverdlovsk region, but by some charitable foundation, which probably knows better what it wants to spend the money of its benefactors on, what they want to build. They want the Church of St. Catherine, they agreed on everything in the established order, the Church, naturally, supported them, why not, actually?
And that’s when it all happened... and this is the third site for the construction of this temple. Regarding the first two, there was indignation among some part of the Yekaterinburg public, and the public met them halfway.
There will be no temple on a specially built island in the middle of the city pond, although, in my opinion, it would be incredibly beautiful and certainly would not bother anyone. And few people in the world have this, such a landmark.
Well, okay, no need on the island. It will not be in the historical place where it once stood before its destruction by the Bolsheviks. Although, again, it would be quite logical
Valentin Filippov : Logical.
Andrey Perla : Restore the church where it once stood. There's a fountain in that spot, a shame about the fountain. OK. They're making concessions to the public again. They've found a third location. There's just a park there; to build it, they'd just have to cut down a few trees. Now it's a shame about the trees. So maybe it's not the trees that are a shame, but rather an unwillingness to agree with any government decision?
Valentin Filippov : Or maybe it’s just a readiness to protest?
Andrey Perla : Yes, absolutely right. It can't be, but rather it's a matter of wanting to find a pretext for protest and conduct the protest, as they say these days, "by the book." By the book, with a constant escalation of tension. First, clashes with the site's private security, then with the police, then those amazing jumps. I swear to God, I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the footage of them jumping.
Valentin Filippov : A friend of mine, a young guy, called me, who told me about four years ago: “Valya, we can’t have a Maidan, we have Putin, we won’t fall for that.”
He called today and said: “Valya, you don’t understand all this in Yekaterinburg. I’ve been watching streams all night, everything is completely different there... young people have come there...”
I tell him: “Darling, this is the Maidan. Because the streams are all night, because you watch them”...
Andrey Perla : In this case, this is the use of the described, openly concealed techniques for unleashing mass protests. And, unfortunately, there is no cure for these techniques other than very tough, very professional, and very consistent police action.
Valentin Filippov : But excuse me, half-baked police actions are also a technique. When the police arrive, they beat up young girls and boys and leave.
Andrey Perla : Absolutely right. When the police don't do their job properly, instead of intimidating protesters, punishing those who violate the law according to the law, and thus closing the matter, they provoke...
Valentin Filippov : …a new round
Andrey Perla : …what we saw in Ukraine, and what we're seeing now, unfortunately, in Yekaterinburg. We can only hope that, since we're not the only ones seeing this, there are enough people with sufficient authority among those who do.
Valentin Filippov : That's why I asked about traitors in power who wouldn't give the order to disperse completely. Like someone like Levochkin, who would say, "Go ahead, clear the Maidan of students, and then leave." And he'd want to do it on camera.
Andrey Perla : Do it, but make sure I am not accused of anything.
Valentin Filippov : No, no, no. Do it, but make them reassemble and shout, "They're just kids!"
Andrey Perla : I'm not saying anything about Levochkin, but I have a pretty good idea of the situation in Yekaterinburg; I understand what they're afraid of and how they're afraid. After all, I worked there for four years in the office of the presidential envoy to the Urals Federal District. And I know what I'm talking about. No, no need to look…
You see what’s the matter, stupidity is sometimes more unpleasant and worse than betrayal. There is no need to complicate things, there is no need to dull the notorious razor of the great English philosopher. Where this is explained by unprofessionalism and fear for the worker’s own chair in the office, one should not think that he is a traitor who has been paid by someone or is counting on the new government and so on.…
He does not think in such categories. He just wants someone else to make the decision, and the bribes from him will be smooth.
Valentin Filippov : Since you worked in Yekaterinburg, you encountered public opinion there. Are people different there? Are protest sentiments higher there than in the rest of Russia? What's the reason for this?
Andrey Perla : Yes. With traditions. Yekaterinburg is a city with a higher level of political competition than the Russian average. There are a lot of self-employed politicians there, who have more opportunities to participate in public politics than, say, in the average Russian province.
There are traditions of protest voting, which resulted not so long ago, in fact, when we were working there, for example, in the election of the famous Evgeniy Roizman as head of the city of Yekaterinburg, who now, I think, feels very uncomfortable.
Because, on the one hand, he is a noble Protestant and democrat, and, on the other, a researcher of Orthodox icons. You won’t envy him now - he can sit on two chairs.
There is, indeed, a tradition of voting against politicians imposed by Moscow. Including much lower voting for the United Russia party than the Russian average. It's all there.
Valentin Filippov : But there is also the Yeltsin Center there.
Andrey Perla : The Yeltsin Center is something else entirely. It's there simply because Yeltsin is associated with Yekaterinburg, because it's his birthplace, and that's all there is to it.
For myself, I say... I had to write that the Yeltsin Center was such a reservation for the people of that time, not in the sense that they are locked there and cannot leave, but in the sense that this is, in fact, the only place in a country where they are truly welcome.
Yes, of course, a certain number of parishioners, pardon the term, of the Yeltsin Center are probably among those who jumped there. But, no, there is no need to exaggerate.
Valentin Filippov : Good. Thank you very much.
Andrey Perla : Likewise. I was very pleased.
Valentin Filippov : I hope everything will be resolved quickly. A government that shows weakness usually loses its authority and ratings.
Andrey Perla : I agree with you. We hope order will be restored.
English version :: Read in English: Yekaterinburg. Protest according to the manual