Courtney Rygalski
Since the Russian Constitution was ratified in 1993, there has only been one amendment to the document. In 2008, the Constitution was amended to extend the presidential term from 4 years to 6 years(Russian Federation Constitution, Article 81). Although this may be the only amendment made to the Constitution, the characteristic that makes it a major amendment is probable power-hungry motive behind the change as well as the predicted undemocratic consequences to the Russian political system.
Since the Russian Constitution was ratified in 1993, there has only been one amendment to the document. In 2008, the Constitution was amended to extend the presidential term from 4 years to 6 years(Russian Federation Constitution, Article 81). Although this may be the only amendment made to the Constitution, the characteristic that makes it a major amendment is probable power-hungry motive behind the change as well as the predicted undemocratic consequences to the Russian political system.
In 2008, Dmitry Medvedev won the
presidential election with 71% of the popular vote, after being personally
endorsed by former president Vladmir Putin(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_amendments_to_the_Constitution_of_Russia).
Almost immediately after taking office, Medvedev, with Putin at his side as
Prime Minister, proposed this amendment to the Federal Assembly, where it met
little, if any, resistance as at the time it was dominated by the ruling
political party-United Russia.
It doesn’t appear that this
amendment was prompted by any “problem” within the Constitution or by a lack of
effectiveness of a 4-year presidential term. The only political situation
occurring at this time was the political domination of Putin, Medvedev and
their party United Russia(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_amendments_to_the_Constitution_of_Russia).
This observation lends support to my hypothesis that the true purpose of the
amendment was simply to extend the president’s power and influence; the
amendment was a clever power move by the ruling political party and its leaders
to maintain its political dominance.
While this claim cannot be directly
proven, it is supported through observations of events occurring after the
amendments ratification, and outlining conjectures of the consequences of this
change for the presidency. First, immediately after this amendment took force,
Putin announced his intent to run for a non-consecutive third presidential term
in 2012 elections, after a request from Medvedev to do so(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_amendments_to_the_Constitution_of_Russia).
This amendment allows Putin to extend his presidency by 2 years, or even 4
years if elected for a second consecutive term. Under the new amendment, a two-term
presidency would allow Putin to rule for 12 years, which is a significant
increase in time; in fact, under the previous term year limits, 12 years
would’ve encompassed three presidential terms. By instituting this new
amendment, Putin essentially circumvented the Russian amendment limiting the
president to serving 2 consecutive terms(Russian Federation Constitution, Article
81). With this change, Putin and the ruling political party(United Russia) has
more time to exert its political influence within the Russian government as
well as more time to entrench itself within the system. Putin, and United
Russia, used their dominant political power to ease the way for their continued
dominance. By engendering this power imbalance, this amendment turns Russia away from its Constitutional democratic
ideals, and further towards an authoritarian system.
Lastly, this is not an issue that
could not have been solved using the rulings of the Constitutional Court.
Article 81 outlines precise term limits for the president, offering no room for
judicial interpretation (Russian Federation Constitution). Judicial
interpretation or judicial review is used for vague provisions that can be
construed in different ways(Lijphart, Chapter 12). However, a provision, like Article 81, that
details specific terms limits is clear-cut. As such, it was appropriate that
this change occurred through use of a formal amendment process.
While it is true that the amendment passed in 2008 did increase the term limits of the presidential office (and the term limits of the representatives of the Duma) it was actually done in a relatively consensual manner. It did not alter any of the checks and balances between the various branches of government so the President's power has remained limited in the same way it had been since the adoption of the Constitution. In addition, the amendment only came into effect for all elections following its passing. Meaning that it is not as though Medvedev orchestrated an increase in the length of his own reign, only for individuals in the post follwing him. While Putin may have been the first individual who benefited from the increased term length, technically it could have been anyone with enough popular support to be elected to the position. It is true that today Medvedev and Putin are both members of United Russia; however, in 2008 when this amendment passed Putin was actually considered an “independent.” (1) These facts make it difficult to assert that the purpose of the amendment was to allow an abuse of power by the presidential office as it did not affect either the president in power at the time the amendment was passed, nor his political party.
ReplyDelete1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Putin
Patricia Hrit
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting that the Russian constitution has only been amended once, but not surprising. Given the difficult amending process we discussed last week, one would not expect to find many amendments, but what is surprising about this amendment is the topic it covers. It does not try to fix a problem with how the country was run, create a new institution or government power, or attempt to clarify a vague portion of the text. Instead, it directly changes it. As Courtney said, a formal amendment is clearly necessary because of how it alters the constitution so directly in a way a new law and judicial review would not allow. I think I am between Celia and Courtney’s views on this amendment. I agree with Courtney that it does increase influence of the presidential office and that it was created for just this. I also believe Celia is correct that it was not a power grab by the United Russia party in an attempt to give Putin, and therefore the party, more power with the next election. I was also struck by how little resistance the amendment faced in the Duma. However, because the nature of the amendment is to give more power to the president, any party or faction within a party coming to power would benefit from the extended influence over the country.
As discussed last week, the amendment process for the Russian Constitution is extremely stringent and has many veto players. Initially I was hesitant to agree with the statement that the decision to extend the length of the Presidential term was probably a "power-hungry motive behind the change as well as the predicted undemocratic consequences to the Russian political system." It was hard to imagine that the system of checks and balances would fail in the attempts to pass an amendment, but upon further reading, I feel that this was put in place to extend control of the United Russia party. This amendment not only increased the term length of the President but also of parliamentary members to five years, further increasing the control of the party (Pan). Since the United Russia party had such extensive control over the political bodies, it was almost impossible for the opposition to have any say. This process of amending the Constitution was also done very hastily, in a span of less than two months of Mededev taking office, while legally there is a one year waiting period to pass the ratification of the Constitution (Pan). After taking this into account, it is very hard to see this amendment as anything more than increasing the party's influence. Therefore, the Constitution was probably amended to maintain a political party's control of the Russian government because they held the majority in the parliament and controlled the executive, it was very hard for the system of checks and balances to be maintained.
ReplyDeleteWorks Cited:
Pan, Phillip. "Russia's Medvedev Signs Constitutional Amendment to Lengthen Presidential Terms." Washington Post 31 Dec. 2008. Web.
Considering how the Russian constitution is less than a quarter decade old, it makes sense that the Russian constitution does not have many amendments yet. As Patricia pointed out, this one amendment that it does have, does not appear to do much besides add power to, the already powerful, position of President. As the President continues to hold such a huge amount of power, I worry that future presidents will continue to make changes to the government, even to the constitution, whose only purpose seems to benefit the president, rather than help develop the country.
ReplyDeleteEven though it is absolutely correct that anyone popular enough could have been elected President after Medvedev, I don’t think that that is the main reason that Putin got the opportunity to again have two terms. With the strong powers that the President has, it is very possible that the power that Putin had during his first term had effects that lasted much longer than those first eight years. It’s not really questioned that Putin played a large part on how Medvedev became President, strongly influencing the changes that the new President would make in that term. Would the connections that he made during
his Presidency still help him out when he does not have the position of President again.
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_Russia
2. Hahn, Gordon M (2010) “Medvedev, Putin, and Perestroika 2.0”, p. 228-259