Comment by FabHK
5 years ago
Here my two cents as someone that has visited, lived in, or good friends in authoritarian regimes such as East Germany, Russia, North Korea, Iran, Hong Kong:
- in a democracy, the population is responsible for what the government does. Conversely, the more authoritarian the regime, arguably the less culpable the population is. (Of course, people shouldn't have allowed an authoritarian figure to gain power... indeed. But frankly, those who live in glass houses should not throw stones.)
- it is imperative to distinguish between the government and the people, in particular in very authoritarian regimes. Sometimes the population is behind their government, sometimes they aren't.
- here, it seems to me that many Russians (and quite possibly the majority) are increasingly critical and sick of Putin, and, as far as I can tell, most are, like the rest of the world, against this war.
- who suffers most from this war are ordinary Ukrainians, obviously. However, I venture to say, most ordinary Russians suffer, too.
- thus, as far as possible, our sanctions should be laser focused at targeting Putin and his collaborators, the inner circle, government, and companies close to the government.
From https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/02/28/world-war-... - targeted sanctions are not enough, because an autocratic leader can use his whole country as his bank account.
Reynolds: I gather you think that sanctions leveled by the government are inadequate to address this much larger threat?
Hill: Absolutely. Sanctions are not going to be enough. You need to have a major international response, where governments decide on their own accord that they can’t do business with Russia for a period of time until this is resolved. We need a temporary suspension of business activity with Russia. Just as we wouldn’t be having a full-blown diplomatic negotiation for anything but a ceasefire and withdrawal while Ukraine is still being actively invaded, so it’s the same thing with business. Right now you’re fueling the invasion of Ukraine. So what we need is a suspension of business activity with Russia until Moscow ceases hostilities and withdraws its troops.
Reynolds: So ordinary companies…
Hill: Ordinary companies should make a decision. This is the epitome of “ESG” that companies are saying is their priority right now — upholding standards of good Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance. Just like people didn’t want their money invested in South Africa during apartheid, do you really want to have your money invested in Russia during Russia’s brutal invasion and subjugation and carving up of Ukraine?
It's more nuanced than that. One should do business with people who are against the regime. If you stop doing business with them - those people will have to do anything to survive including being more dependent on regime's assistance, developing dependency and loosing even more of their free agency.
This is also why sanctions are targeted - you need a carrot and a stick.
You highlight the difference well between a democracy and an authoritarian regime.
However the suggestion you make at the end, that we should only sanction Putin & co., is exactly the type of measure that would work in a democratic regime but not in an authoritarian one.
I can't think of a single case where a large authoritarian regime was handed off gently to a democratic one as a result of sanctions on the dictator.
Can you think of a case where sanctions have produced the desired effect of the regime change?
I live in Serbia which was under heavy sanctions in early 90s: those in power have only gotten richer and more powerful during the time. Only after economy started recovering in late 90s, and people could afford to worry about "freedom" instead of basic survival did people get enough democratic momentum to vote incumbents out (sprinkled with a bit of West-supported protests to avoid a possibly rigged second round with 47% votes for opposition to 32% for incumbents in the first round iirc).
But sanctions did nothing to hurt those in power. They did plenty to hurt the rest of us.
In oppressive regimes, fewer resources need to be put into building infrastructure and improving the human condition of its citizens when more and more of the country's income is generated by harvesting natural resources or via other tasks that mostly require unskilled labor. Democracies only really build infrastructure because their citizens need it to focus on generating economic growth via their own skilled labor, which often can't be done without roads, stable electricity, clean drinking/industrial water, etc.
In these situations, for republics like the United States, the best way to encourage the country to improve the standard of living for the citizens is via sanctions since it forces the country to sell these commodities at lower prices to a smaller group of potential buyers. If enough countries limit trade to where the country has to primarily rely on its own citizens for economic stability, they'd be further pressured into at least partially building schools and infrastructure and other things we/the United States believes should be a bare minimum for life.
2 replies →
I suspect They also weaken the general military capability given economy generates the tax to pay the military. Not a perfect system of course.
I think the point is to make the populace angry enough that they assist in overthrowing the regime.
I have no problem making life harder for Russians, having them cancel their holiday in Turkey, wait in line a bit, move to a new VPN. Maybe that will make some realize that something is wrong with their entire government and they need to revolt and change that fast. This after Aleppo and the rest.
I think that the government of a country is a lagging metric of the value of its people.
I just don't think human psychology works this way. Your attitude is akin to a parent's with a child, "your actions have consequences, so do better". But Russia's parent in this analogy is Putin, and he will use such things to his advantage. Your approach might feel just, but the message will be completely lost.
You will note how many Western governments over the past few days have been saying explicitly: "These sanctions are not meant at the Russian people, we see that they did not want this war". It doesn't seem like this is even true from polling, but it's calculated messaging, and it's important.
You are using an analogy to a totally different domain (parent / child) where the rules of the game is totally different (in parent / child relationship, everything is controlled and non-escalatory: it's about education and the assumption is that there is no violence). In this frame of reference you might win the argument.
But my argument is different. If because of sanctions Russians people start to think a little bit and question their government, that will be a start. That may not happen to be honest because as I said, the government of a country is a reflexion of the values of that country. And I am not sure for Russia.
I have family in Moldova and in far-east Russia. I was talking to a cousin in the far-east and I can't even believe the discussion we had few weeks ago.
It’s just a desire for revenge. Whatever solutions this approach promises are imaginary.
Throughout most of history, and in pretty much every non-democratic country, people must die to change the government. You've seen what Putin does to dissidents and even to protestors. Most revolts require decades of fighting and huge numbers of lives lost.
It's pretty evil to expect a populace to do that. In fact it is scarily similar to the ideas within early soviet governments, that mass death now is worthwhile and acceptable to allow for a promised utopia later.
I'm not sure I agree.
This somehow reminds me of how Putin, in his ridiculous speeches, cited NATO involvement in Serbia and Iraq as a reason to attack Ukraine. Of course, the western politicians responsible for those decisions are now gone, because unlike Putin, they respected term limits.
The US hasn't had a perfect track record in the "wars of choice" department. The US voter does have some moral responsibility for it. The flaw, however, would be in saying as Putin does that the US political system is totally invalid for this, or justifies bad behavior elsewhere.
I guess all the Putin supporters outside of Russia are very lucky to not have to move their domains off namecheap!
then my value as a person living in the US is net negative to the world ?
i say this as someone living in US borders and citizenship
Whoever is responsible/culpable doesn't matter. Sanctions aren't about punishing the population, they're about inciting a change.
A happy population doesn't riot and revolt. You need a miserable population to get something like that to happen.
Do you have any prior evidence that sanctions have led to protests/riots that have successfully overthrown a regime?
Throughout history, revolutions only succeeded when there were enough privileged people on "their" side (eg. those with money, status...). I am not sure where the idea that sanctions work to this effect came from, but I have yet to see it: miserable population is scrambling to survive, not to fight ideological battles.
As an example, Serbia, where I am from, has been under heavy sanctions in early 90s: you'd be buying car fuel in 1.5l bottles smuggled from neighbouring countries, inflation was so bad that the day after paycheck, I'd be getting half of my parents salary for pocket money... Economy started recovering in late 90s after sanctions were abolished, and regime change happened in year 2000.
People talk about the "overthrow" outcome a lot but overthrowing the regime is like the biggest outcome you can get, you don't have to overthrow the whole regime for sanctions to be effective. Regime leaders respond to economic threats like anyone else, it may not cause a revolution but if the threatened sanctions are sufficient, it affects their behavior.
Here's a topical example: Russia threatened Ukraine with sanctions if Ukraine signed a free trade deal with the EU [1] [2]. It effectively stalled free trade talks between Ukraine and the EU.
That happened in late 2013. In a twist of irony, this enraged ordinary Ukrainians and kicked off the Euromaidan protests that forcibly deposed Ukraine's president at the time - Viktor Yanukovych - and toppled his regime. This led to the annexation of Crimea and, well, the rest is history.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine-eu-russia/russia-ste...
[2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-25401179
> Throughout history, revolutions only succeeded when there were enough privileged people on "their" side (eg. those with money, status...).
Counterpoint: what about the French revolution?
You are absolutely right that it's easier to have revolts led by the privileged - the American revolution was one. I'm sure there were plenty of others.
As for sanctions causing regime change, you may be right. But that's also not the goal here - the goal is to tank Russia's war effort and generally cause pain for him and his cronies. Of course plenty of people are probably hoping regime change will result but I doubt it'll be a direct consequence, if it happens at all.
3 replies →
Sanctions aren't about regime change, I think.
Autoritarian regimes with a lot of money can do more damage than those with few. As witnessed this week.
Throughout the history, trade happened with partners. Western world made it seem like taking it away is a sanction instead of having it as a "gift to improve each others country".
This could be reversing because of Russia now.
"Do you have any prior evidence that sanctions have led to protests/riots that have successfully overthrown a regime?"
Yes, the Soviet Union.
3 replies →
sanctions are always paid by citizens. EU countries closing their airspace to russian flights are hitting their own EU citizens getting stuck in Russia and having more troubles and increased expenses to get back to their home. So anyone starting to make sanctions hitting me, I'll consider him/her personally responsible
All the reporting from (non-kremlin) sources that I've seen say that Putin is quite popular with the average Russian: https://theconversation.com/putins-public-approval-is-soarin....
You're right: I realised that the Russians I know skew urban and young and are not representative; and Putin seems to have majority approval [1].
Still not sure that changes in attitude will come about by making life more miserable for ordinary Russians; and even if the majority disapproves of Putin, there is not much they can do about it [2].
[1] https://www.levada.ru/en/ratings/
[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/23/world/europe/russia-ukrai...
> And yet there is desperately little that Russians can do to change their country’s trajectory.
1 - russian propaganda. we do not have an institution of social polls, at least real ones
1 reply →
That's the sad thing about this. They don't know better, rural areas only have tv-propaganda.
Additionally, that report is from 23/02. I believe that opinion should have shifted quite a lot already.
What an arrogant, ignorant comment. Do you seriously think that all those people living different lifestyles to you, who don't live in cities, and believe different things, do so only out of ignorance? If you're an wealthy, urbanite westerner, do you realise that in terms of your belief system, lifestyle, and values, you are such an astonishing minority? What would all those people make of your beliefs? "All he has is his Fox News/CNN propaganda, he doesn't know any better".
2 replies →
> arguably the less culpable the population is
This may be, but it begs the question: who is most responsible, then? Certainly not the people outside of Russia, yes? If the Americans invaded Russia, for the sole purpose of arresting Putin, this would result in worldwide, humanity ending nuclear devastation, including in Russia. It simply must be the Russian people that hold the most culpability for holding Putin to account then.
Is it fair? No, certainly not, but tell that to the Ukrainians being murdered by Russian people right now.
Putin is responsible, and the higher-ups.
But since Putin does have fairly high approval, the population is somewhat responsible too.
Yes of course, but Putin isn’t going to hold himself to account, so the question is, who is next in line to hold him to account.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30507142.
Those are good points, but I don't quite agree because there's a few things to add to the list:
- Putin's popularity jumped up during the invasion to 69% - which is a lot.
- Only 5% of Russians believe that Russia is responsible for the incursion, while 50% believe that the problem is NATO (I understand at least part of this is due to heavy propaganda)
- While the choice for war is a bit ambiguous and probably errs one way or the other depending on how much propaganda buy in there is, the fact of the matter is that Russians will ultimately, proudly accept the annexation of Ukraine as their vassal state and buy into the notion of that broader destiny of Neo Russia that Putin is pushing for. The 'We Are One People' is enough to elicit the cultural chauvinism among the population so that while they may not support conflict, they will accept, and possibly promote the outcome without any regard for the self-determination of the Ukranians.
(Obviously, this is due to a lot of propaganda and lack of real exposure to other information, but it is what it is.)
- Chinese citizens are broadly happy to see the crackdowns in Hong Kong (i.e. "Why do those they believe they should have special rights, especially when they are attacking China!"), and fully accept the 'regional internment' of the Uyghurs, including re-education prisons for many specific individuals purely on the basis of their ethnicity. Similarly the eradication of Tibet as an entity. And of course, the possible invasion of Taiwan that we might see in the coming years.
There is a degree of complicity among the population, at least for the nationalist claims, especially to the extent they look past the materiality of some of the violence etc.
Second, is that the citizens probably need to be informed of the issue. While the sanctions might form a bit of a blip in the Ruble, it's not going to affect most people's lives particularly dramatically, it may just slow the economy down in largely imperceptible ways to the general population. Many will blame 'NATO' for their disinvitations to sporting events.
It's dramatic for a Western-connected software developer who has the means to get a flight, and who cares about Ruble/USD exchange, but not likely for most of the plebes.
Therefore - it might be a good idea to do 'populist sanctions' - like shutting down all the Starbucks, McDonald's, IKEAS, Netflix, Hollywood films, Nikes, NBA games, televised football of all kinds - all those things and more.
I'd say include iPhones/Android but probably we want to maintain for them an outlet for information from the outside, and frankly to collect data if we need it. But we could dramatically reduce what's available in the App Stores, stop selling a bunch of variations and product lines etc.
None of that is hugely material at all, it's not going to harm anyone frankly, it won't hugely affect the economy, but it's a 'really strong daily reminder' of the fact that 'they are excluded' from the system. No more 'nice lattes', because 'we don't like you right now'.
> While the sanctions might form a bit of a blip in the Ruble, it's not going to affect most people's lives particularly dramatically, it may just slow the economy down in largely imperceptible ways to the general population
Every Russian economist I'm reading is in mourning (you can see it in their faces) and is promising a severe commodity deficiency and high prices on consumer goods in the near future.
I think they expect something like the beginning of the 90s, but even more severe, close to zero outside help, and low chances for recovery.
All of my Russian friends have been in panic since the 24th. I am too, honestly, I have already lost 25% of my income (which was not very high even before) for not doing anything wrong and just being close to Russia.
(I support Ukraine and the Western response, but we'll be collateral damage nevertheless.)
I don't doubt a cohort of educated young Russians has an inkling, but the population overall, not so much.
It's the same everywhere though. A lot of people don't pay attention, are not literate.