IS RUSSIA TOO UNIQUE TO LEARN FROM ABROAD ? ELITE VIEWS ON FOREIGN BORROWING AND THE WEST , 1993-2012

For more than two centuries, Russia has struggled to defi ne its historical-cultural relationship with the West, as its intellectual and political elites vigorously debated whether their country should emulate Europe or follow a distinct path of development. This article uses original elite survey data to examine these two propositions. The article reaches two conclusions. First, despite Russia’s long tradition of underscoring its uniqueness, close to three-quarters of Russian bureaucrats and Duma deputies in the mid-1990s were nonetheless willing to borrow from foreign experience, particularly from the models of European welfare capitalism. Second, despite the sharp rise in anti-Western sentiments emanating from the Kremlin over the past decade, as well as Vladimir Putin’s ever-growing emphasis on Russia’s distinctiveness, Russian elites are still surprisingly willing to adopt political and economic models from the West.


IS RUSSIA TOO UNIQUE TO LEARN FROM ABROAD? ELITE VIEWS ON FOREIGN BORROWING AND THE WEST, 1993-2012
Sharon W. Rivera http://dx.doi.org/10.18611/2221-3279-2016-7-1(22)-31-40For more than two centuries, Russia has struggled to defi ne its historical-cultural relationship with the West, as its intellectual and political elites vigorously debated whether their country should emulate Europe or follow a distinct path of development.This "Slavophile-Westernizer controversy," as it is sometimes called, constitutes a protracted and deeply divisive national conversation, in which the Slavophiles emphasize the uniqueness of Russia and the inadvisability of importing Western models of development.Or as Tim McDaniel defi nes it, the Russian idea is "the conviction that Russia has its own independent, selfsuffi cient, and eminently worthy cultural and historical tradition that both sets it apart from the West and guarantees its future fl ourishing." 1 Richard Sakwa adds, "Almost every signifi cant writer has had something to say on the question of 'the Russian idea,' and the whole notion is central to the debate over Russia's path of postcommunist development and the relevance of Western notions of liberal democracy to Russia.The Russian idea in one way or another suggests a unique path for Russia…" 2 Statements issued by Russia's postcommunist presidents suggest that the conceptualization of Russia's national identity is still highly contested.Boris Yeltsin adopted a decidedly pro-Western stance early in his presidency, but in the course of a few years found himself casting about for the creation of a national idea.The government newspaper Rossiiskaya gazeta even sponsored a public contest during his presidency to help spur the development of a unifying "idea for Russia."Yet despite the "oceans of ink spent printing ruminations about Russia's special path," the contest ultimately "produced no winning pithy formula or catchy slogan." 3 Since Vladimir Putin became president in late 1999, his statements regarding this issue have been mixed, though they have increasingly emphasized Russia's uniqueness.One Russian scholar contends that contemporary Russian identity -for both those in power and the mass public -had crystallized by 2007; one can fi nd in it "stable verbal and speech blocs," such as "the inappropriateness of Western models for Russia," "our uniqueness," and "our unique path." 4 These themes were on prominent Another characteristic of this period is the sharply critical view of Western countries (and especially the U.S.) that became dominant in the state-controlled media beginning in Putin's second presidential term.As a result of this sea change, and undoubtedly in part as a result, the attitude of Russian elites toward the USA have soured, such that a much higher percentage of elites now holds the views that the USA represents a threat Russia than did so in the early 1990s. 6hese twin phenomena -the centuriesold belief in and Putin's renewed emphasis on Russia's uniqueness, and the increasingly nationalism and the issue of cultural and сivilizational identity) // Polis, 2007, No. 6, p.  36 The article reaches two conclusions.First, despite Russia's long tradition of underscoring its uniqueness, close to threequarters of Russian bureaucrats and Duma deputies in the mid-1990s were nonetheless willing to borrow from foreign experience, particularly from models of European welfare capitalism.Second, despite the sharp rise in anti-Western sentiments emanating from the Kremlin over the past decade, as well as Vladimir Putin's ever-growing emphasis on Russia's distinctiveness, Russian elites are still surprisingly willing to adopt political and economic models from the West.

DATA AND METHODOLOGY
In the fi rst empirical section of this study, the analyses are based on data from an original survey of Russian political elites that COMPARATIVE POLITICS . 1 ( 22) / 2016 СРАВНИТЕЛЬНАЯ ПОЛИТИКА И ГЕОПОЛИТИКА I conducted between February and July 1996 in collaboration with the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Sociology. 7For that survey, I drew two samples of national elites: 1) a random sample of parliamentary deputies in the lower house of Russia's national legislature, the State Duma; and 2) an interval sample of top-level bureaucrats working in all federal ministries except for the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Internal Affairs.In other words, in that study, I defi ne political elites in the same manner as a landmark study of elites in seven advanced industrial democracies did over thirty years ago: as parliamentarians and high-ranking civil servants. 8As in the aforementioned study, the bureaucrats directed departments, divisions, or bureaus in federal ministries, were located in the nation's capital, and held positions roughly one to two rungs below the minister.Eighty-three Moscow-based interviews were conducted in all, with 45 deputies and 38 civil servants.Of the initial samples, 81.8% of the deputies and 74.5% of the civil servants were successfully interviewed.Those response rates mirror or surpass the rates attained in other elite studies, including the research done in Britain and Italy by Robert Putnam. 9 In the following empirical sections, I draw on data from a six-wave series of interviews of Moscow-based foreign policy elites that span both the Yeltsin and Putin eras.The  surveys -conducted in 1993, 1995, 1999,  2004, 2008, and 2012 and commissioned by William Zimmerman -include between 180 and 320 respondents each, for a total of 1,421 individuals. 10The respondents were selected on the basis of positional criteria and were employed in a broader range of institutions than those whom I interviewed in my 1996 survey -i.e., in the media, state-owned enterprises and private businesses, academic institutes, the executive and legislative branches of the government, and the armed forces. 11The sub-groups contain between thirty and forty individuals each.

ELITE RECEPTIVITY TO FOREIGN BORROWING FOLLOWING THE COLLAPSE OF COMMUNISM
Although the Slavophile-Westernizer controversy originated in pre-revolutionary Russia, intense debate about Russia's identity among political elites has continued into the contemporary era.In the post-Soviet period, Gennadii Zyuganov, the leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, has been a vocal proponent of the view that Russia is an "original organism [that] has its own special laws of development."In fact, he has called Russia "a unique type of civilization -one that is the heir to and successor of the thousand-year-old tradition of Kievan Rus', the Muscovite kingdom, the Russian empire, and the Soviet Union." 12In contrast, Russia's fi rst president, Boris Yeltsin, emphasized the utility of borrowing from foreign models.For instance, in September 1991, Yeltsin was told in an interview that Mikhail Gorbachev had recently expressed his support for Swedish social democracy as the best model for Russia and was then asked, "What is your model, Yeltsin's model?Perhaps it is the model of The stamp of approval Yeltsin gave to foreign borrowing resonated among the political elites of that period as well, as illustrated by my 1996 elite survey data.In response to the question, "Could you name any country which could serve as a model for Russia with respect to its political-economic development?" 14only about a quarter of the respondents were resistant to importing models from abroad.Specifi cally, 26.5% of the respondents (22 in all) expressed fi rm opposition to borrowing from the experience of another country (see Table 1).I have labeled these respondents "traditionalists," or those who believe that foreign models of societal development cannot or should not be transplanted to Russian soil.In their view, Russia is too unique to adopt formulaic policy prescriptions; rather, solutions should be found within the context of history and national tradition.In other words, Russia has its own path (svoi put') that it must follow.As one bureaucrat stated: "Foreign experience is hardly 100% -and not even something like 30% -applicable to Russia.It's too unique a country" (G-109). 15 The "traditionalist" label was applied not only to those who objected to the wholesale importation of foreign models to Russia since few policymakers would advocate the transplantation of a model without any adaptation.Indeed, as Richard Rose argues, "differences in time and space normally make impossible a carbon copy of a program in effect elsewhere." 16Rather, the essence of traditionalism, as I defi ne it, is an unwillingness to seriously consider transferring elements of foreign models to Russian soil.Those who refer only to periods in Russia's past as appropriate models are also included in this category.
When pressed to elaborate on their reluctance to import foreign models to Russia, traditionalists did not proffer explanations that are prominent in the literature on democratic transitions.For example, although arguments about the uniqueness of the Russian transition from authoritarian rule often highlight the Political factors, such as Russia's weak political institutions, are also not prominent in their responses and were mentioned only six times.
Rather, many based their reasoning on the idea of Russian exceptionalism.Specifi cally, eight of the 22 traditionalists discussed the Russian mentality (mentalitet) as constituting a serious obstacle to borrowing ideas from abroad; eight referred to Russia's multi-ethnic and/or multi-confessional nature; nine named its long and/or distinctive history; and three mentioned its cultural traditions.Additionally, thirteen traditionalists pointed to Russia's unique geography as a barrier to the import of foreign models.The following represents a typical traditionalist commentary: "Russia is a particular (osobennaya) country, a unique country.There are no analogues to it in nature or the world, so to speak… All countries have their own special features.Germans have their own mentality and Russians have their own… Look, who has a history like Russia's?What country could possibly have such a history?" (D-030) In contrast to the traditionalists, Table 1 reveals that close to three-quarters of the elites are coded as either "pure voluntarists" or "quasivoluntarists.""Pure voluntarists," comprising 38.6% of the respondents, were quick to name a specifi c country or countries that could serve as a model for Russia and usually offered a reason or two for their selection.For example, one pure voluntarist discussed the merits of both Switzerland and Sweden in terms of political institutions: "Well, I think that Switzerland is a good modeland the Swedes are also good, well organizedeven though one is a republic and the other is a monarchy.But we could borrow a lot from their governmental structures...In Switzerland, there are cantons, which are essentially analogous to the subjects of the Russian Federation.They have a very high degree of freedom and independence and at the same time comply with federal legislation."(D-007) "Quasi-voluntarists," comprising yet another 32.6% of the respondents, fall somewhere between the traditionalists and pure voluntarists.As with the traditionalists, they believe that Russia's uniqueness limits the applicability of foreign models to Russia.Yet following a voluntarist mindset, they add that partial lessons can be learned from foreign countries and/or that Russia should seek to appropriate the best that world experience has to offer.A typical quasi-voluntarist had this to say: "No, I can't name one country that we should blindly copy.First, Russia has its own historical roots, its own distinctiveness, and it's impossible to transfer various systems to Russian soil mechanically.Moreover, the results will be undesirable.We need to take all the very best that has been achieved in other countries.There should be no blind copying from a single country."(G-077) To sum up, in 1996 close to three-fourths of the parliamentarians and bureaucrats whom I interviewed expressed receptivity to the transplantation of ideas and institutions from abroad to Russia.The remainderconstituting only slightly more than a quarter of the respondents -emphasized Russian exceptionalism and were drawn to the promise of a uniquely Russian model of development.Given the emphasis on Russia's uniqueness that has been espoused by many Russian historians, philosophers, and politicians over the last two centuries, this high degree of openness to borrowing from abroad in the mid-1990s is particularly noteworthy.

RISING ANTI-AMERICAN SENTIMENT
Although the pro-Western euphoria of the immediate post-communist period had dissipated and anti-Western sentiment had started to rise already in the early 1990s,18 elite surveys register a sharp increase in suspicion of the West only during the latter half of the 1990s.This is illustrated by the responses to Zimmerman's survey question regarding whether "the USA represents a threat to Russian national security."As the solid line in Figure 1 shows, in 1993, the percentage of respondents adhering to this 36 СРАВНИТЕЛЬНАЯ ПОЛИТИКА . 1 ( 22) / 2016 СРАВНИТЕЛЬНАЯ ПОЛИТИКА И ГЕОПОЛИТИКА position was at its lowest, at 26.0%.By 1995, just over half (50.6%) of the respondents espoused this view, and by 1999, this fi gure had risen to 59.2%.The high point of concern about a threat emanating from the U.S. appeared in 2008 -the year of the Russian-Georgian warwhen more than two-thirds of all respondents (69.7%) perceived the U.S. to be a threat to their country's security.Although there have been valleys as well as peaks since the early postcommunist years in these threat perceptions, the percentage of elites sensing danger originating in the United States never dipped lower than 41.7% between 1995 and 2012.As Zimmerman and his collaborators write, "….although the post-crisis periods -2004 and 2012, respectively -saw anti-American sentiment fall somewhat, it was still signifi cantly higher in 2012 than in 1993.Moreover, the trend was observed among all [age] cohorts." 19Zimmerman, William et al. Russian Elite-2020: Valdai Discussion Club Grantees Analytical Report, Moscow, July 2013.P. 31. 20The fi rst survey question reads as follows: "Do you think that the policy of the U.S. represents a threat to Russian security?"(1993, 1995) or "Do you think that the USA represents a threat to Russian national security?"(1999, 2004, 2008, 2012).The data points represent those who responded "yes" as a percentage of all respondents, including those who gave a "don't know" response.The second survey question reads as follows: "For each country that I will now name, please tell me your opinion about how friendly or hostile this country is toward Russia today: very friendly, rather friendly, neutral, rather hostile, or very hostile."In the 2008 and 2012 surveys, the fi rst phrase reads: "For each international organization or country that I will now name…" The data points represent all those selecting either "rather hostile" or "very hostile" as a percentage of all respondents, including those who gave a "don't know" response.
A second question in the Zimmerman survey confi rms this growing apprehension among Russian elites about the aims of the U.S. Respondents were asked for their views on a series of countries (and, beginning in 2008,  international organizations).For each country, they were asked whether it was "very friendly, rather friendly, neutral, rather hostile, or very hostile" toward Russia today.As the dashed line in Figure 1 shows, only 9.5% of all respondents in 1993 considered the U.S. to be either "rather hostile" or "very hostile."This percentage rose to 52.1% in 1999, dipped to 31.3% in 2004, and then spiked to 70.5% in 2008.Although the percentage of elites believing that the U.S. is hostile to Russia declined to 40.0% in 2012, this still represents almost a fourfold increase from the percentage espousing that position in 1993.

ATTITUDES TOWARD FOREIGN BORROWING DURING THE PUTIN YEARS
So how did this signifi cant rise in anti-Americanism on the part of Russian elites affect their willingness to borrow from the West?Earlier I hypothesized that any elite receptivity to foreign borrowing that existed in Russia during the 1990s would have declined sharply by the time Putin returned to the presidency in 2012.To ascertain whether these expectations are borne out, I focus on this question in the six-wave set of elite surveys conducted between 1993 and 2012: some people believe that Russia should follow the path of developed countries, integrate into the world community, and absorb the experience and achievements of Western civilization.Other people, taking into account the history and geographical location of Russia at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, believe that it should follow a unique Russian path.Which of these statements is closer to your point of view? 21he results of these six surveys are presented in Figure 2. As the top (dashed) line in the fi gure illustrates, the percentage of respondents believing that Russia should follow its own path has indeed increased over time, but only marginally.In 1995, slightly more than half COMPARATIVE POLITICS . 1 ( 22) / 2016 СРАВНИТЕЛЬНАЯ ПОЛИТИКА И ГЕОПОЛИТИКА from Western models varies across the two surveys used in this analysis.Specifi cally, the percentage of respondents identifi ed with the traditionally Slavophile point of view is higher in the six-wave elite survey than in my 1996 elite survey: in 1995, 52.8% of Zimmerman's respondents believed that Russia should "follow a unique Russian path," compared to the 26.5% of respondents whom I coded as "traditionalists" in my 1996 survey.There are several plausible explanations for this discrepancy, all of which derive from the question wording used in the surveys.
First, the six-wave survey offers only two choices -integrate with the West or follow a distinctly Russian path.No "quasi-voluntarist" position akin to the one available in the 1996 study was available to respondents who believe both that Russia's uniqueness places some limitations on the applicability of foreign models to Russia and that useful lessons can nonetheless be gleaned from foreign countries.If such a choice had been added to Zimmerman's forced-choice answers to more closely parallel coding used in my 1996 survey, I suspect that many of his "Slavophiles" would have selected this intermediate option.
A second reason that the distribution of Westernizers and Slavophiles differs between the two surveys relates to whether the survey question includes the phrase "unique path" (osobyi put').The 1996 survey did not mention those words but instead probed respondents' attitudes with a broad, open-ended question: "Could you name any country which could serve as a model for Russia with respect to its political-economic development?"In contrast, the Zimmerman survey asked specifi cally whether respondents advocated following "a unique Russian path."This concept is a broad, widely-used phrase that encompasses a wide range of ideas, some of which are only vaguely, if at all, related to whether Russia should shun the adoption of Western models and instead turn inward for political and economic inspiration.To illustrate the imprecision of this phrase, one need only examine a survey question that the Levada Center has asked the Russian mass public since 2008: "When you hear about Russia's 'unique path,' what, above all, comes to mind?"One possible answer (favored by 16-22% of of the respondents (52.8%) selected the second option in the survey question -that given its history and geographical location, Russia should "follow a unique Russian path" [idti osobym rossiiskim putyom].Yet by 2012, this percentage had settled in at only 3.9 percentage points above the 1995 fi gure, at 56.7%.Even in 2008, when U.S.-Russian relations were at the lowest point in years, the share of respondents who favored a unique Russian path was just 5.3 percentage points higher than in 1995, or 58.1%.Source: Data from six-wave elite survey described in William Zimmerman et al., Russian Elite-2020: Valdai Discussion  Club Grantees Analytical Report (Moscow, July 2013).
As with the "Slavophiles," the trend line for the "Westernizers" exhibits remarkable stability over time.The middle (dotted) line of Figure 2 shows that in 1995, 41.1% of elites believed that "Russia should follow the path of developed countries, integrate into the world community, and absorb the experience and achievements of Western civilization."By 2012, this percentage had fallen by only 4.4 percentage points, to 36.7%.

METHODOLOGICAL EXTENSIONS
A careful observer might notice that the overall distribution of attitudes toward borrowing respondents between 2008 and 2013, depending on the year) is indeed the "incompatibility between the values and traditions of Russia and the West."But another answer that rivals it in popularity (favored by 15-20% of the respondents) is the following: "Giving due consideration in politics to the spiritual and moral aspects of the relationship between the state and its citizens."And the response selected by a plurality of respondents in each year (namely, between 30-42% of respondents) is: "The economic development of the country, but with more concern for people rather than for profi ts or the interests of the wealthy." 23Since the concept of Russia's "unique path" evokes numerous images, the elites queried in the sixwave survey likely imputed their own preferred meaning to it.As a result, the inclusion of this phrase in Zimmerman's survey question may have attracted more respondents to the "traditionalist" position than would otherwise have been the case.
A fi nal explanation for the higher percentage of Slavophiles in the six-wave survey is that its Westernizer option is associated only with following the route of developed countries and absorbing the experience and achievements of Western civilization.In the 1996 survey, by contrast, respondents were coded as voluntarists or quasi-voluntarists as long as they favored borrowing from any other country or region of the world.As a result, Zimmerman's survey forced those willing to borrow foreign modelsbut from non-Western regions -to select the Slavophile response.Indeed, a closer look at the countries that the 32 voluntarist respondents in my 1996 survey mentioned as potential models suggests that such a group may have been a sizeable one.Of the 57 responses, 73.7% did focus on countries or regions that are part of the established West, but the remaining 26.3% of the countries named by the voluntarists were located in South America, Asia, or East Central Europe.

СРАВНИТЕЛЬНАЯ ПОЛИТИКА И ГЕОПОЛИТИКА
In support of this interpretation, Figure 1 shows that in 2012, after four years of Dmitrii Medvedev's presidency (which featured the well-known "reset" of US-Russian relations), elites' concern about a threat to Russian national security originating in the U.S. was the lowest it has been since 1993.
A second possibility is that Russian elites make a clear distinction between the U.S. and Europe.Thus, although anti-American sentiments may be high, Russian elites are still receptive to importing models from other Western countries.In support of this interpretation, my 1996 surveys make clear that European advanced industrial democracies are far and away the most attractive models for Russian elites.Specifi cally, 59.6% of all countries mentioned by the 32 pure voluntarists in that sample (i.e., individuals who believed that Russia's development might follow the path of a foreign model and named a specifi c country or region as an examplar) were located in Western Europe. 25Hence, elites may be willing to "follow the route of developed countries" (by which they mean Europe), while still remaining apprehensive about and suspicious of the U.S.

Figure 1 .
Figure 1.Anti-Americanism in the Russian Elite 20
]; See also Aron, Leon.Why Putin Says Russia Is Exceptional // Wall Street Journal.May 30, 2014; Evans, Alfred B. Power and Ideology: Vladimir Putin and the Russian Political System.Carl Beck Papers in Russian and East European Studies.January 2008, No. 1902, pp.12-15.
December 1992/January 1993 for the 1993 survey; November for the 1999 survey; March/April for the 2004 survey; and July/August for the 2012 survey.In addition, William Zimmerman records that the 1995 survey was conducted in October and November.See Zimmerman, William.The Russian People and Foreign Policy: Russian Elite and Mass Perspectives, 1993-2000.Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002.P. 20. 11immerman, William.Slavophiles and Westernizers Redux: Contemporary Russian Elite Perspectives // Post-Soviet Affairs, 2005, Vol.21, No. 3, p. 185.Mitterand's France, or John Major's Britain, or the United States, or Japan, or Spain,or Germany?"To this question, Yeltsin replied, "I would take everything together; I would take the best from each system and introduce it in Russia...You cannot just take a model and install it ready made.Maybe create a new model, but take something from the Swedish model, and why not take a piece from the Japanese modelan interesting piece -and from the French, too, especially as regards the parliamentary aspect?And in the United States, where they have 200 years of democracy... they have a defi nite framework for this democracy, and that's interesting too.So, in principle, I am in favor of social democracy, but nevertheless, to take the best there really is in these countries.13 12 Зюганов Г.А.Россия и современный мир.-М.: ИИА «Обозреватель», 1995.-C.20.[ZyuganovG.A. Rossiya i sovremennyi mir (Russia and the contemporary world).-Moscow:IIA «Obozrevatel'».1995.C. 20.]; See also Remnick, David.Resurrection: The Struggle for a New Russia.New York: Vintage Books, 1998.Pp.311-316.François developing at a very high rate.Russia was able to provide everyone with bread and butter and meat and fur and so on...Various kinds of standard approaches to transition won't work for Russia" (G-086).
14See Appendix A for the original question wording in Russian.15Thesenumbersrefer to the interviewees in the study.'D'denotes deputies and 'G' stands for government bureaucrats.wasSource: Author's database.Note: Percentages do not sum to 100.0% due to rounding.
of an established market economy, 17 only one traditionalist discussed this issue explicitly (although another four traditionalists cited structural aspects of the Russian economy as an impediment to foreign borrowing).
16 Rose, Richard.Lesson-Drawing in Public Policy: A Guide to Learning Across Time and Space.Chatham, NJ: Chatham House, 1993.P. 3. absence

Is Russia Too Unique to Learn From Abroad? Elite Views on Foreign Borrowing and the West, 1993-2012 Sharon Werning Rivera,
PhD, Associate Professor of Hamilton College, Member of the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies For more than two centuries, Russia has struggled to defi ne its historical-cultural relationship with the West, as its intellectual and political elites vigorously debated whether their country should emulate Europe or follow a distinct path of development.This article uses original elite survey data to examine these two propositions.The article reaches two conclusions.First, despite Russia's long tradition of underscoring its uniqueness, close to three-quarters of Russian bureaucrats and Duma deputies in the mid-1990s were nonetheless willing to borrow from foreign experience, particularly from the models of European welfare capitalism.Second, despite the sharp rise in anti-Western sentiments emanating from the Kremlin over the past decade, as well as Vladimir Putin's ever-growing emphasis on Russia's distinctiveness, Russian elites are still surprisingly willing to adopt political and economic models from the West.Key words: Russia, theWest, development, civilization, democratization, Slavophiles,  Westernizer, elite, elite survey, civil society, identity.