The Russian Federation in the first quarter of the 21st century. The president has set tasks until 2030

Автор: Ilyin V.A., Morev M.V.

Журнал: Economic and Social Changes: Facts, Trends, Forecast @volnc-esc-en

Рубрика: Editorial

Статья в выпуске: 1 т.17, 2024 года.

Бесплатный доступ

March 15-17, 2024, the presidential election will be held in Russia. The election will take place in a very specific context due to the ongoing special military operation, aggravating threats to national security posed by NATO countries, and a range of internal changes that Russia has been going through since the beginning of the special military operation. Against the background of the alarming situation around Russia, the RF President delivered his annual Address to the RF Federal Assembly on February 29, 2024; he presented a program of actions and specific public policy measures for the next six years (until 2030). The Address had certain aspects reminding of an election speech and was intended not only for government bodies at all levels of public authority, but also the broad strata of Russian society. In fact, the head of state outlined the contours of Russia’s future for the next political cycle, and this is important amid uncertainty and a high level of risks that the country is facing at the present historical moment (after the start of the SMO). The article presents our own approach to analyzing the current situation in the country (including the 2024 presidential election), based on our long-term monitoring of public administration effectiveness, the system-wide nature of which is determined by the comprehensiveness of the empirical base (analysis of national and regional statistics, including those of own compilation; sociological surveys, analysis of expert assessments and key decisions taken by the President and the RF Federal Assembly). Scientific novelty of the study lies in a comprehensive analysis of the effectiveness of public administration during Vladimir Putin’s first four presidential terms (2000-2024), that is, during the first quarter of the 21st century. In this context, we analyze general goals, objectives, and principles of public administration formulated by Vladimir Putin as he assumed office as president for the first time; key initiatives and decisions he adopted in order to address the tasks set; internal and external conditions in which the head of state had to achieve national development goals; key stages that the country went through over the past 23 years; and the main results with which it “approached” the beginning of a new political cycle.

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2024 presidential election, address to the federal assembly of the russian federation, national development goals, civilizational crisis, sovereignty, national identity

Короткий адрес: https://sciup.org/147243034

IDR: 147243034 | DOI: 10.15838/esc.2024.1.91.1

Текст научной статьи The Russian Federation in the first quarter of the 21st century. The president has set tasks until 2030

February 29, 2024, Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered his annual Address to the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, which (as experts noted) became “one of the most powerful presidential addresses in recent years” ¹ . “Vladimir Putin has clearly set Russia’s priorities on the world stage, our goals and interests, development strategy and the future of the world order” ² .

Addressing the Federal Assembly and the citizens of the country as a whole, Vladimir Putin stressed that “even during the most difficult periods, Russia has never given up on addressing its fundamental imperatives, has always thought about the future, and we must do the same now” ³ .

In 2024, the Presidential Address has a special significance for the country.

“ The primary purpose of every Address to the Federal Assembly is to offer a forward-looking perspective. Today, we will discuss not only our short-term plans, but also our strategic objectives and matters which, I believe, are instrumental in ensuring steady long-term development for our country ”⁴.

First , it has some features of an election campaign speech: on March 15–17, 2024, the presidential election will be held in Russia, and the assessments of almost all experts, as well as opinion polls, indicate that Vladimir Putin will be second-to-none.

According to VCIOM, 76% of Russians plan to participate in the presidential election, while 75% are going to vote for Vladimir Putin5.

“The presidential election is, doubtless, the crucial political event in the life of the country. And it may sound dramatic, but the 2024 election will have global importance . It will be watched all over the world – by our friends and by our so-called partners...

The upcoming election will be unique, because never in recent history have we been at such a difficult and, perhaps, fateful phase in the country’s life... We can assume that the upcoming campaign will be one of the defining moments in the process of forming an updated value framework of Russian society . The country will choose both the president and the long-term semantic and ideological trend of its future life.. . Of course, Vladimir Putin will have competitors, but their role has already been largely predetermined by the situation ”⁶.

This is largely why (or, in part, as an indication of the importance of complying with the Law on Strategic Planning ⁷ ) “the program of actions and concrete measures” voiced in the Presidential Address was considered “in the horizon of the next six years” ⁸ (2024–2030; Insert 1 ).

Second , the main feature of the latest Presidential Address consists in the fact that the election of the head of state in 2024 will be held in a very special context due to the SMO (which has been going on for two years) and the unprecedented threats to Russia’s national security from NATO member states. This circumstance makes the results of the vote so important: indeed, the country, as experts note, “will choose both the president and the long-term semantic and ideological trend of its future life ” ⁹ .

The acute phase of the Russia–NATO conflict, into which our country was drawn as a result (there is no denying that) of a rather successful U.S. strategy to foment a de facto civil war between fraternal Slavic peoples, takes place not only on the battlefield, but also in all spheres of life:

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politics, economics and, most importantly, culture, in the field of moral values. In this sense, one cannot but agree with experts who claim that this conflict is of a civilizational nature . “Now Russia is facing not only a traditional military and political challenge, but also a threat at the level of identity and history, which determines the existential nature of the current conflict ” ¹¹ .

This is also evidenced by numerous public statements made by western politicians since the beginning of the SMO and revealing the true goals of the Collective West: the goals that have nothing to do with “protecting democracy in Ukraine”; the goals that imply “cancelling Russia” and “inflicting a strategic defeat on Russia”.

“In order to effectively confront the West in the war of civilizations that Russia is already involved in, it is necessary to take into account the hierarchy of plans. The highest level is identity:

– what is the identity of the enemy (who are we fighting?);

– what is our own identity;

– what is the identity of other civilizational actors?

It is necessary to start with the above civilizational map... only a civilizational approach allows us to talk about sovereign public consciousness, and, therefore, about sovereign science and sovereign education... This is a final warning for Russian humanities: either we move quickly to the paradigm of a civilizational approach (Russia = sovereign civilization), or we write a letter of dismissal”¹².

In the Editorial section of our journal, we regularly present the opinions of experts (such as A. Dugin, A. Fursov, etc.) who adhere to the civilizational approach, considering the history of Russia’s development in the context of the centuries-old confrontation between the Russian and the Anglo-Saxon civilizations.

“The Western elite make no secret of their goal, which is, I quote, ‘Russia’s strategic defeat’… This means they plan to finish us once and for all ”¹³.

“ The whole of geopolitics is based on the consideration of the eternal confrontation between the civilization of the Sea (thalassocracy) and the civilization of the Land (tellurocracy). Vivid expressions of these principles in ancient times were found in the confrontations of land-based Sparta and the harbor city of Athens, land-based Rome and the maritime Carthage... As politics became global, these two civilizations finally acquired a spatial embodiment. Russia – Eurasia became the core of the Land civilization, and the pole of the Sea civilization became entrenched in the zone ofAnglo-Saxon influence: from the British Empire to the United States and the NATO bloc. This is how geopolitics sees the history of the latest centuries... ”¹⁴

“Our task is to survive and preserve ourselves as a special socio-cultural type, as a special variant of civilization... the survival and preservation of the population, the preservation of us as a sociocultural type, a special historical one, which is at least a thousand years old. This is, if you like, a national idea. But I would say it is a civilizational idea ”¹⁵.

However, the specifics of our approach lies in analyzing the transformation of the Russian state and society over a more limited historical period of time: in the post-Soviet period, or, rather, during Vladimir Putin’s presidential terms (from 2000 to the present), largely because this period of time is taking place “here and now”, “before our eyes”, and we are not just researchers of the past, but direct participants in the current events.

Considering this phase in Russia’s history (national and global events; key decisions made by the President; processes taking place in the public administration system; dynamics of public sentiment, etc.), we see that the 2024 presidential election is important not only in in the context of the events taking place after February 24, 2022; it is also a critical stage in the entire historical development of the Russian Federation over the past 24 years and a foundation for its further development in the coming decades.

It is worth noting that if Vladimir Putin wins the upcoming election, this will be one of the longest periods in the history of Russia when one and the same person is the head of state ¹⁶ . If such a period is interrupted, this may cause another “trauma” in society, like it was after the collapse (or rather the demise) of the USSR, a purposeful act orchestrated by the United States within the framework of the Cold War, with direct participation of Russian elites who committed national betrayal in the 1986–1990s. ¹⁷

Objective data from official statistics clearly demonstrate the extent and depths of social implications of the “trauma”, which is putting the very existence of the country at risk (Tab. 1, 2) .

Table 1. Dynamics of the spread of some social pathologies in Russia in 1990– 1999, per 100 thousand people

Indicator	1990	1999	Dynamics, 1999 to 1990, %
Suicide death rate	26.4	39.3	149
Homicide death rate	14.3	26.2	183
Death rate from accidental alcohol poisoning	10.8	20.5	190
Incidence of drug addiction and substance abuse	4.3	43.0	1000
Number of persons who committed a crime, thousand people	897.3	1716.7	191
Source: Federal State Statistics Service.

Table 2. Dynamics of the standard of living indicators (1994–1999)

Indicator	1994	1999	Dynamics, %
Number of people with incomes below the subsistence level, million people	33.3	43.8	132
Number of people with incomes below the subsistence level, % of the population	22.4	29.9	133
Unemployment rate, % of the economically active working age population	8.2	13.0	159
Source: Federal State Statistics Service.

We should emphasize that the main cause of the “traumatization” of Russian society in the late 1980s and early 1990s was the very collapse of the USSR, which (as Zh.T. Toshchenko points out) “disrupted the progressive development of the state and society” ¹⁸ .

“Progressive development of the state and society” is a feature that can be applied to modern

“The radical changes that took place in Soviet/Russian society during perestroika and then in the 1991–2000s caused the emergence and consolidation of new traumatic features (characteristics) of public consciousness... First of all, there was a disorientation and disorganization of public consciousness... Of particular importance... was its traumatization, expressed in a split, bifurcation, inconsistency and conflict of development ”¹⁹.

Russia. The unified management style implemented by Vladimir Putin since 2000 and up to the present allows us to consider the past 24 years as a separate historical phase in Russia’s development. This period has its own goals and objectives; it is united by the basic principles of government. It has its own periodization, logic of development, and its own results, as well (so far, they are intermediate).

The goals and objectives of national development were outlined by the President back in 1999 in his first program article “Russia at the turn of the Millennium”, in which Vladimir Putin noted: “The chances for a decent future are as follows: the Russian idea, a strong state and an efficient economy ” ²⁰ .

These guidelines, although they seem rather broad, actually became the basis for Vladimir Putin’s practical actions, concrete legislative decisions taken by the head of state and the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation throughout the period from 2000 to the present (Insert 2) .

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* The activities of Navalny’s headquarters are recognized as extremist and banned in the territory of the Russian Federation.

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The facts presented in Insert 2 indicate that all the key management decisions made by Vladimir Putin over the past 24 years were aimed at the implementation of the guidelines he had announced at the very beginning of his work as president.

And during the same period, he publicly announced the principles of public administration that he was guided by throughout his presidential terms: personal responsibility and state interests .

“In Russia the head of state has always been and will always be the person who is responsible for everything in the country… my work will be guided solely by the interests of the state. Perhaps it will not be possible to avoid mistakes , but what I can promise and what I do promise is that I will work openly and honestly”²⁵.

principle of “equidistance of all market entities from power”. He stressed that nothing can be done in the country without creating “absolutely equal conditions” for all market participants and participants in the game on the political stage; and that this is “essentially the process of creating a new image of the country ”.

“We believe that all the players in politics and the economy must have a level playing field so that nobody can gain any advantages by cozying up to the authorities from the left or the right... Nothing can be accomplished without solving this issue. That is why the building of a legal structure and the fight against corruption take on such importance. This is not just routine work in the law enforcement field. It is, in effect, about creating a new image of the country ”²⁶.

We should note that these principles manifested themselves not in the public rhetoric of the head of state, but in practice, when the President had to deal with one of the most “painful” issues at that time – the power of the oligarchs.

February 28, 2000 (in fact, on the eve of the presidential election held on March 26), Vladimir Putin announced to the “high and mighties” the

At the same meeting, the oligarchs received a clear signal that work should be conducted around the national idea, rather than a particular political figure; this dealt a blow to the very essence of the so-called “semibankirshchina” ²⁷ , the most notorious representatives of which were subsequently either arrested or ousted from the country.

“I don’t think our campaign should center around a concrete political figure; instead, we should effectively unite around a political theme, around ideas that appeal to the majority of the country’s people”²⁸.

The principle of “hands-on control” manifested itself throughout virtually all of Vladimir Putin’s presidential terms:

V in the very nature of the public administration system, which experts called “Politburo 2.0” in 2012 ²⁹ , and in which the President plays the role of “chief arbiter”;

V in making a decision on the accession of Crimea and Sevastopol to the Russian Federation (2014);

V in the amendments to the Constitution of the Russian Federation initiated by the head of state, which required, among other things, a change of the Government (2020) ³⁰ ;
V during the COVID-19 pandemic;

V and, of course, in making a decision to start the SMO and in Vladimir Putin’s actions in the subsequent period, when he, as “the person responsible for everything in the country”, was required to fulfill the role of not only the head of the public administration system, but also the supreme commander-in-chief, and the national leader around whom society is consolidating.

Thus, the goals, objectives, practical actions and principles that guided Vladimir Putin over the past 24 years were formulated and publicly announced at the very beginning of his presidential activity, and today they form the unity of the historical process within which the country was developing during this period.

Moreover, the progression of Russia’s historical development was preserved, even though the external and internal conditions were changing, and the world itself changed dramatically.

“…both Russia and the world have seen drastic, and even dramatic, colossal changes. Twenty years is not a long period by historical standards, but during eras when the entire world order is crumbling , time seems to shrink… More events have taken place in the past 20 years than over decades in some historical periods before, and it was major changes that dictated the fundamental transformation of the very principles of international relations ”³¹.

The context in which the President implemented national development tasks prove that the entire history of Russia over almost a quarter of a century has been the history of its struggle to strengthen national sovereignty, to revise the results of the Cold War and the positions the country had lost under the leadership of Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin, and a struggle against the Collective West trying to hamper this process.

1. “For a country like Russia, existence, mere existence, is impossible without sovereignty. Without sovereignty, Russia would cease to exist ”³².
2. “…I think this is important for everyone that no enduring international order is possible without a strong and sovereign Russia ”³³.

“The concentration of power in the hands of Yeltsin and his clique has led to a historical disaster . It brought about the death of almost 10 million people who did not survive the “reforms” of the 1990s; the collapse of most of the industry and agriculture; the loss of all foreign policy positions. This is, in fact, an external management regime , when American advisers were sitting in Russia’s ministries and dictating what to do and how to do it”³⁴.

In his recent public speeches, Vladimir Putin pointed out that in the early 2000s he tried to integrate Russia “into the family of so-called civilized countries”, and “suggested Russia’s accession to NATO” (Insert 3).

However, the only Russia that was acceptable to the West and with which it could coexist was a Russia of the 1990s, or (in the words of Western politicians themselves) a “gas station masquerading as a country” ³⁵ . The reasons for this (according to experts) are “the unwillingness to deal with Russian Federation as a global competitor, the desire at all costs to preserve the formal and informal rules of the game that were established in 1987–1994 and that are unilaterally beneficial for the Collective West” ³⁶ .

“The so-called West, with its colonial practices and penchant for inciting ethnic conflicts around the world, not only seeks to impede our progress but also envisions a Russia that is a dependent, declining, and dying space where they can do as they please ”³⁷.

The President found such a Russia unacceptable, and he openly stated this, addressing the Western political establishment directly on February 10, 2007, during his speech at the Munich Security Conference: “Russia is a country with a history that spans more than a thousand years and has practically always used the privilege to carry out an independent foreign policy. We are not going to change this tradition today... ” ³⁸

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⁴⁰ Vladimir Putin’s speech at the meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club, October 5, 2023. Available at: http://www.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/72444
⁴¹ Vladimir Putin’s interview to Tucker Carlson, February 9, 2024. Available at: http://www.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/73411

Subsequent events (the 2008 war in Georgia, mass protests in 2011 – early 2012 ⁴² , which were fueled by the Western media ⁴³ and which occurred exactly when Joe Biden failed to persuade the then Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to run for a second term so as to prevent the possibility of Vladimir Putin becoming president for the third term ⁴⁴ , the 2014 coup d’etat in Ukraine) – all these were attempts by the Collective West to stop the process of strengthening Russia’s national sovereignty.

Since the very beginning of his work as president, Vladimir Putin was focusing on strengthening national defense capability, the vertical of power and the national identity of Russian society. Thus, he understood that the Collective West would not be able to accept Russia’s sovereignty so easily because its hatred (or maybe even fear) toward the successor of the USSR runs too deep; and the USSR represented an effective alternative to the liberal ideology of the Western “consumer society”.

Here it will be appropriate to recall exactly how historical documents describe the U.S. foreign policy in relation to the Soviet leadership.

Excerpt from NSC 20/1: U.S. Objectives with Respect to Russia, August 18, 1948: “Our basic objectives with respect to Russia are really only two: a. To reduce the power and influence of Moscow…; b. To bring about a basic change in the theory and practice of international relations observed by the government in power in Russia… ”

December 15, 2021 (that is, 21 years after Vladimir Putin talked to Bill Clinton about the possibility of Russia joining NATO), the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation handed over to the American side a draft treaty between the Russian Federation and the United States of America on security guarantees and an agreement on measures to ensure the security of the Russian Federation and Member States of the

North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Moreover, as noted on the official website of the Russian Foreign Ministry, “the American side was given the necessary explanations of the logic of the Russian approach in a detailed form, and the relevant arguments were presented ” ⁴⁵ .

In fact, it was another attempt to come to an agreement with the United States, like the one that the President had undertaken in the early 2000s. We may call it the second proposal for peaceful

In December 2021, we officially submitted draft agreements on security guarantees to the USA and NATO. In essence, all key, fundamental points were rejected. After that it finally became clear that the go-ahead for the implementation of aggressive plans had been given and they were not going to stop ”⁴⁶.

coexistence of sovereign Russia and the Collective West. But it was an attempt to reach an agreement at a qualitatively different level : it was not put forward by a “post-Yeltsin” Russia, but a stronger Russia, with a high level of consolidation of society around the President and patriotic values, with an amended Constitution, with a neutralized “fifth column”, with a reviving military-industrial complex, with large-scale international relations…

Therefore, the nature of this attempt was appropriate – from the standpoint of the national interests of sovereign Russia , it was Putin’s “ultimatum”, as “dubbed” by the Western media (the American magazine National Interest )” ⁴⁷ . In particular, one of the key conditions of this “ultimatum” was as follows (Article 4): “The Russian Federation and all the Parties that were member States of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization as of 27 May 1997, respectively, shall not deploy military forces and weaponry on the territory of any of the other States in Europe in addition to the forces stationed on that territory as of 27 May 1997 ” ⁴⁸ .

However, instead of looking for compromises ⁴⁹ , NATO countries put into effect their “Ukraine as an anti-Russia” plan, and our country was forced, instead of just strengthening its national sovereignty, to defend it, and to fight for its preservation.

Therefore, the inevitability of the SMO, its forced nature (which the President has always emphasized) is perhaps the main thing that one needs to know about Russia’s position in this conflict. Vladimir Putin pointed out many times: “It was not us who started the so-called “war in Ukraine.” On the contrary, we are trying to end it” ⁵⁰ .

“We were not the ones who started the war in Donbass, but, as I have already said many times, we will do everything to put an end to it” ⁵¹.

And, as we see, only a complete and in-depth analysis of the entire period of Vladimir Putin’s presidential terms allows us to fully understand the essence of this inevitability: starting with his first steps to “equidistant” the oligarchs from power, through the 2007 Munich speech and the 2014 “Crimean Spring”; and, on the other hand, considering all the numerous attempts of the Collective West to stop the process of strengthening Russia’s national sovereignty, to return it to the “semi-colonial” state in which it existed after the defeat in the Cold War and the collapse of the USSR in 1991.

Thus, schematically, the entire chronology of the stages that have led to the phase of active confrontation between Russia and NATO looks like this:

1. 2000 – rejection of Vladimir Putin’s proposal to build partnership relations with the West.
2. February 10, 2007 – Vladimir Putin’s Munich speech.
3. 2014 – coup d’etat in Ukraine. Accession of Crimea and Sevastopol to the Russian Federation ⁵² after a referendum held in Crimea on March 16, 2014 ⁵³ . “Crimean Spring”.
4. 2021 – Russia’s demands for security guarantees (in fact, Vladimir Putin’s second attempt to build peaceful relations with the Collective West, which was also ignored).
5. February 24, 2022 – present – special military operation.
6. October 5, 2022 – admission of four new constituent entities to the Russian Federation – the Donetsk People’ s Republic, the Lugansk People’s Republic, the Zaporozhye Region, and the Kherson Region ⁵⁴ .

In addition, the process of strengthening Russia’s national sovereignty, implemented by the RF President over the past 24 years, has been complicated not only by the situation in the international arena (regular attempts by the Collective West to interrupt this process), but also by the internal situation in the country, which can be called the “legacy of the 1990s”: the presence of a significant number of high government officials, who (here we agree with many experts) can hardly be called “elites” (Insert 4) .

In his Address to the Federal Assembly, the President pointed out: “The word “elite” has lost much of its credibility. Those who have done nothing for society and consider themselves a caste endowed with special rights and privileges… are definitely not the elite ” ⁵⁵ .

The so-called “elites” impede56 the implementation of national projects, facilitate the inclusion of Russia in the Bologna education system, promote the optimization of healthcare, guide the activities of the Central Bank that receives instructions from the “global financial backstage” (as some experts have long noted)57; the “elites” are behind many other processes, which are also aimed at including Russia in the system of the Western world, but with one caveat – on any terms, but without preserving national sovereignty.

According to experts, before the start of the SMO, the President could only “slowly push aside the liberal ‘coterie’, but he could not oust it completely, so as not to quarrel with the West” ⁵⁸ .

“Former Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov* has left Russia and now lives in Latvia. Deputy Prime Minister Aleksandr Dvorkovich has left for the United States. Israel was chosen as a place of residence by former deputy heads of government I. Klebanov, A. Khloponin and Ministers Ya. Urinson and M. Akimov. Former head of State Property A. Kokh lives in Germany. V. Khristenko has an apartment in Spain. Former Deputy Prime Minister O. Golodets lives in two countries, one of them is Spain. Former heads of the Presidential Administration of the Russian Federation live abroad (V. Voloshin, V. Yumashev with B. Yeltsin’s daughter Tatyana), as well as former ministers and their deputies (A. Kozyrev, E. Skrynnik, A. Vavilov, I. Chuyan, A. Reimer, etc.), many former governors and their deputies, hundreds of federal government officials!”59

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After February 24, 2022, when the situation changed dramatically and there was a surge in threats to national security, many representatives of the so-called ‘elites’, who did not see how they can link their personal lives with that of Russia, left the country on their own. As the President noted on March 16, 2022, the process of “natural and necessary self-purification of society” began in Russia ⁶⁵ .

At the same time, many experts started pointing out that the head of state should take more decisive steps toward the nationalization of the elites.

“The state has done a lot to marginalize radical liberals. This process began in 2000 and took 24 years with several administrations changing. The influence of the liberals on the ideology of Russia has steadily declined, but it remains very significant, primarily in culture, education and science. Only liberals, or those who have not received clear and precise instructions from above, can fight liberalism so uncertainly and for such a long time. While just as steadily, but just as slowly – sometimes freezing in the same frame for a year or more – patriotism was rising. This was demanded by “Crimea Is Ours”, and even more so by the SMO. But even here, the government acted as cautiously and uncertainly as it did with the dismantling of liberalism”⁶⁶.

However, while all the goals of the SMO have not yet been achieved (“demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine” ⁶⁷ ) and while agreements on peaceful (albeit “cold”) coexistence with the Collective West have not been reached, it is hardly possible to solve the problem of nationalization of the elites.

First , the process of formation of new elites is still “stalling” ⁶⁸ in Russia. As the President pointed out, a new Russian elite must be formed from the participants of the special military operation. “They should take leading positions in the system of education and upbringing of young people, in public associations, state-run companies and privately held businesses, federal and municipal administration. They should head regions and enterprises, as well as major national projects” ⁶⁹ (to this end, in his Address to the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, the President announced a new mechanism for the formation of managerial personnel – a special personnel program “Time of heroes” ).

“…today I met with students who temporarily quitted studying, many of them went to the war zone – it these people that should form the elite of the country in the future ”⁷⁰.

“Starting March 1, 2024, the veterans of the special military operations, as well as soldiers and officers who are currently fighting in active units, will be able to apply to be in the first class of a special personnel training program. Let us call it Time of Heroes. This program will be built according to the standards of our best projects, namely, the Higher School of Public Administration, also known as the “school of governors,” and the Leaders of Russia contest. Their graduates tend to reach high positions in many spheres, and even become ministers and heads of regions”⁷¹.

Second (according to experts), the “personnel revolution from above” will lead to the “inevitable weakening of the state and the emergence of so many vulnerabilities that, under the current civilizational confrontation with the West, will give the latter a lot of opportunities to take advantage of the situation” ⁷² .

Thus, today, after two years of the SMO, as well as on the eve of the presidential election, the situation inside and around Russia remains extremely tense:

^ we see attempts to drag our country into a full-fledged war with NATO, without any reservations (at least, many Western politicians are actively “preparing” the population of their countries for such a scenario ⁷³ );

^ in this regard, the forecasts of many experts about the prospects for the use of nuclear weapons are becoming more alarming;

“In fact, everything is heading toward the use of nuclear weapons and, possibly, the destruction of humanity... Liberalism and its agenda have brought humanity to a dead end. Now the choice is either the liberals or humanity”74.

“ The main customers for the sovereignty strategy are Putin and several people in his entourage... the emergence of Putin and his group is not natural, but accidental, spontaneous. I f Yeltsin’s group had seen Putin through, they would never have chosen him. If there had been another person instead of Putin, we would have had a different Russia, a second Ukraine. In fact, a Yeltsin’s Russia is still alive and hidden behind Putin’s back in many ways. And everyone is scared: if Putin leaves, they will come out. Everyone understands this; therefore, the main goal of the West is to remove Putin.

They know: if Putin is removed, the elite will falter. And the people in Russia know it. The elite is deceitful and corrupt. It is dully silent and keeps up the facade. No one has combed it out yet, and even Putin’s inner circle lacks those whom the people could trust and who could continue the struggle for sovereignty. But there are plenty of those who either will not cope, or will bring back Yeltsinism”⁷⁵.

^ in the internal situation, as before, only the President and several people in his entourage (as experts note) remain the only “customers” of Russia’s movement toward full national sovereignty. Many representatives of elite circles continue to live as they used to, hoping that everything will return to normal.

^ According to VCIOM, the majority of Russians support Vladimir Putin’s decision to launch a special military operation (throughout the entire period of the SMO, the proportion of those who share this opinion remains stable – 65–68% ⁷⁶ ); however, some analysts still pay attention to the fact that 28% of citizens do not agree to live according to the principle “Everything for the front, everything for the Victory!”. This figure is a “significant indicator. It is almost a third of the respondents; it is difficult to declare them cowards, traitors, weaklings, foreign agents, to drive them out of the country” ⁷⁷ .

^ In addition, Russian political scientists predict that the U.S. will tamper with the very presidential election, using technologies that began to be developed a year before the start of the special operation ⁷⁸ .

In these alarming conditions, it is extremely important that the head of state and the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, from the very beginning of the special military operation, have adopted many managerial decisions that are aimed at the highest priority tasks ensuring Russia’s national security: supporting SMO participants and their family members, improving the financial situation of the population and the economy of the country, increasing the defense capability and information security of the state, etc. (Insert 5).

The “Horizon 2040” project was launched in November 2022 by the Agency for Strategic Initiatives and the Russian Export Center. The supervisory board (the highest collegial management body) is headed by the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin. According to the authors, “the main objectives of the project are to form a vision of key challenges and trends that can occur with varying degrees of probability in major areas of socio-economic life of both the Russian and global communities, as well as identify key opportunities and threats to development on the horizon of 2040... “Horizon 2040” brought together more than 130 leading Russian experts in the fields of demography, ecology, climate, energy, technology, space, healthcare, food, socio-cultural issues and economics”⁷⁹.

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We should note that not only the head of state, but also the expert community has a clear idea about the future of Russia, about the priorities of its internal development, international relations and, in general, about the role of our country in an emerging multipolar world (Inserts 6, 7). After the beginning of the SMO, there appeared a large number of publications on this topic⁹⁰, as well as large-scale projects bringing together dozens of experts from various fields of knowledge, such as “Horizon 2040” and “Worldview of Russian Civilization. Through Polyphony to Symphony”.

The “Worldview of Russian Civilization. Through Polyphony to Symphony” project was first presented on December 9, 2023 at a conference at the Saint Petersburg State University organized by the Izborsk Club. Experts from the Izborsk Club are authors of the project (A. Prokhanov, V. Averyanov, M. Maslin, A. Ivanov, A. Boldyrev, V. Bagdasaryan, etc.). According to V. Averyanov, “the goal of the project is to formulate the foundations of the national worldview as a result of the sum of collective efforts of many generations of thinkers, the “conciliar mind”... The successful implementation of the project will make it possible to equip the Russian administrative and political elite with a worldview apparatus in order to manifest a more unambiguous and effective vector of state identity”⁹¹.

A clear understanding of Russia’s future, expressed in the Presidential Address and in the assessments of many experts, inspires optimism and urges us to focus on the present-day issues: how effectively will Russia be able to overcome this dangerous historical period in all respects? When will this happen and what position in the geopolitical space will our country have after the end of the SMO? Will the ideological, spiritual and moral trend set by the “Crimean Spring” and launch of the SMO continue and forever change the face of the country (society, culture, ruling elites ...)?

All these issues are acute, and it is still difficult to find answers to them (there are too many unknowns in the equation). But in the end, we need to remember how effectively the President and Russia as a whole have managed to cope with all the challenges that have stood in the way of the historical movement toward strengthening national sovereignty over almost a quarter of a century.

This is clearly evidenced by objective data from official statistics and indicators of subjective assessments of public opinion: according to the key indicators of national and social development (such as the area of Russia’s territory, population, life expectancy, objective and subjective indicators of the dynamics of the standard of living and quality of life, death rate from murders and suicides, assessment of activities of the authorities, etc.) Russia under Vladimir Putin has made a significant step forward compared to the condition in which Boris Yeltsin “left” it in 1999 (Tab. 3).

And it is no less important that over the past 20 years the understanding of the country’s development vector toward the “revival of the great power”, “the return of socialist ideals and values”

Table 3. The results of Vladimir Putin’s presidential terms according to official statistics and people’s subjective assessments

Indicator	1999 (last year of Boris Yeltsin’s presidential term)	2023*	Dynamics (+/-), 2022 to 1999
Official statistic indicators**
Area of the Russian Federation, thousand square kilometers	17075.4	17125.2	+49,8
Population (at the end of the year), million people	145.6	146.4	+0,8
Life expectancy at birth, years	65.93	72.73	+6,8
Ratio of average incomes of the richest 10% to the poorest 10%, times	14.1	13.8	-0,3
Number of unemployed, thousand people	9094	2951	-6143
Number of people with money incomes below the subsistence level, % of the total population	28.4	9.8	-18,6
Number of registered crimes, thousand	3001.7	1966.8	-1034,9
Death rate from homicide, per 100 thousand people	26.2	3.7	-22,5
Death rate from suicide, per 100 thousand people	39.3	9.2	-30,1
Indicators of subjective assessments of the population***, % of respondents
Level of approval of the RF President’s work	8.6	61.4	+53
Share of positive assessments of purchasing power of incomes	27.9	62.7	+35
Share of positive assessments of social self-identification	23.3	45.2	+22
Share of positive assessments of social mood	31.0	65.6	+35
Share of positive assessments of stock of patience	43.6	76.6	+33
Dynamics of protest potential	35.2	17.7	-18
* Statistical data – for 2022; data from opinion polls – for 2023. Sources: Federal State Statistics Service, Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation. * Source: VolRC RAS public opinion monitoring.

Table 4. Perceptions of the region’s population concerning the idea of uniting Russian society*, % of respondents

Answer option 2002 2023 Dynamics (+/-), 2023 to 2002 The idea of uniting the peoples of Russia in order to revive it as a great power 22.6 49.3 +27 The idea of strengthening Russia as a state governed by the rule of law 22.1 35.8 +14 The idea of uniting peoples to solve the global problems facing humanity 7.8 23.9 +16 Return to socialist ideals and values 6.6 19.7 +13 The idea of uniting all Slavic peoples 5.0 17.4 +12 The idea of confrontation with the West, self-reliance 3.2 13.7 +11 The idea of individual freedom, the priority of the interests of the individual over the interests of the state 3.9 8.5 +5 The idea of national uniqueness, a special historical mission of the Russian people 2.3 9.0 +7 The idea of rapprochement with the West, Russia’s entry into the pan-European community 3.9 4.4 +1 The idea of cleansing society through the Orthodox faith 4.1 3.1 -1 Other idea 0.2 2.3 +2 Difficult to answer 31.9 22.1 -10 The wording of the question “What idea, in your opinion, is capable of uniting our society?” No more than three possible answers. Source: VolRC RAS public opinion monitoring. and “confronting the West with our own means” has strengthened in society and in public consciousness (and not only in strategic documents or targets set out by the head of state) (Tab. 4).

In our opinion, the change in Russian society over the past 20 years (strengthening its national identity) is the overall result of the entire period of Vladimir Putin’s presidential terms (including his Munich speech, “Crimean Spring”, amendments to the Constitution of the Russian Federation, etc.), and not only a consequence of the growing threats to national security in the context of the SMO.

Thus, a fact-based analysis of the political course pursued by Vladimir Putin over the past 23 years shows that it has always been based on the task of restoring Russia’s sovereignty, which it lost after the collapse of the USSR. In order to continue to fulfill this task in the face of threats and obstacles purposefully created by the Collective West so as to slow down the process of strengthening our country’s national sovereignty, the head of state had to radically change the course of the Russian Federation’s foreign policy: from sincere intentions and real attempts to integrate Russia into the Western world to a direct opposition to the NATO bloc (and the only reason for such a “U-turn”

was the refusal of the Collective West to recognize Russia’s national sovereignty).

Currently (after the beginning of the SMO), Russia is going through an extremely difficult and dangerous, but crucial historical period accompanied by comprehensive internal changes, which should be considered exclusively in the context of the entire historical path of Russia’s development in the first quarter of the 21st century. And the 2024 presidential election is one of the important intermediate stages of this path.

Ultimately, at stake in the civilizational conflict between Russia and the Collective West is the possibility of our country moving toward the future, the guidelines of which were announced in the Presidential Address on February 29, 2024. The question is whether this movement will be interrupted, and Russian society plunged into another state of “trauma”…

Therefore, it is for a reason that the head of state ended his Address with what is the crucial point at the moment: “Today, making good on all these plans directly depends on our soldiers, officers and volunteers – all military personnel that are now fighting at the front… It is our fighters that are creating today the absolutely essential conditions for the future of the country and its development”⁹².

Список литературы The Russian Federation in the first quarter of the 21st century. The president has set tasks until 2030

Balatsky E.V., Ekimova N.A. (2022). Social contract in Russia: Before and after 2022. Journal of Institutional Studies, 3, 74-90 (in Russian).
Dementiev E.V. (2023). Communicative concept of the social contract and formation of the course of economic development. Ekonomicheskie i sotsi-al'nye peremeny: fakty, tendentsii, prognoz=Economic and Social Changes: Facts, Trends, Forecast, 16(4), 57-70 (in Russian).
Toshchenko Zh.T. (2023). Social contract as a noumenon: The experience of sociological understanding. Sotsiologicheskie issledovaniya=Sociological Studies, 6, 3-15(in Russian). EDN: YCTSAA
Toshchenko Zh.T. (2008). Paradoksal'nyi chelovek: monografiya [The Paradoxical Man: A Monograph]. 2nd edition, revised and supplemented. Moscow: UNITY-DANA.
Toshchenko Zh.T. (2015). Fantomy rossiiskogo obshchestva [Phantoms of Russian Society]. Moscow: Center for Social Forecasting and Marketing.

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