At the end of the 19th century and early 20th century, the young German party system
experienced a significant change by the descent of its most explicitly antisemitic
components.[11] [This was surprising, because] only a few years before, some seemingly vigorous
ultra-nationalist parties, founded during the 1870s–1880s, had been on the rise, and,
together with the increasingly antisemitic Conservative Party, won a majority in the
1893 Reichstag elections. Also, a multitude of antisemitic literature had been circulating in Germany
for more than two decades at this point.[12] [Yet, this did not prevent the fact that] the electoral fortunes of the antisemitic
parties, other than the Conservative Party, declined in the first decade of the 20th
century.”[13]
It could be said that this was good news. But was it? Apparently, it was not, because “the decline of the antisemitic parties was . . . not symptomatic of a decline
in antisemitism, for these particular parties had already performed their historic
role of moving antisemitism from the street and the beer hall’s Stammtisch into the electoral booth and the seat of parliament . . . . The antisemitic parties
had rendered themselves moot. They could quietly disappear, leaving the political
terrain to more potent successors who were fit for the next upsurge in antisemitic
expression and activity.”[14] In fact, what Umland is describing here is a process of Unkulturaufstieg—the spread of uncivilized ideas “from the street and the beer hall’s Stammtisch [table]” to society as a whole—including its higher echelons. Umland also observed
an interesting parallel between the situation in Germany in the first decade of the
last century and the situation in contemporary Russia. In the second half of the 1990s we could equally observe a generalized rise of illiberal trends and anti-Western opinions in the Russian population. However,
at the same time, “those anti-liberal Russian parties that in the middle of the 1990s
still had relative success at the elections (for instance the Communist Party or the
Liberal-Democratic Party), despite these tendencies, could not improve their attractiveness
for the electorate.”[15] Umland rightly concluded that the German experience should be a warning against
premature optimism concerning the state of affairs in Russia. As was the case in pre–World
War I Germany, the present period in Russia is one in which chauvinist and ultranationalist
ideas are permeating society. This process of Unkulturaufstieg is especially visible in the United Russia party, a party that has put so much effort
into presenting itself as a moderate “center” party.
Putin’s “State of the Union”: Touting Patriotism
In Russia the mixture of racist street hooliganism, the presence of fascist parties
in the Duma, and the spread of fascist and ultranationalist ideas by a multitude of
groups, websites, and blogs, have led to a generalized climate in which ultranationalist
chauvinism has become acceptable. During Putin’s first presidential term the political elite still tried to distance
itself from this overzealous ultranationalist fervor. Responsible for ruling the country,
United Russia and the leadership presented themselves as democratic, pragmatic, and
middle of the road: not left, not right, trying to keep a safe distance from the LDPR
and the CPRF, as well as from radical right wing groups. This neutral, pragmatic,
technocratic attitude was, first of all, displayed by Putin himself. Marlène Laruelle,
for instance, characterized Putin in this period as follows: “[T]he new president
cast himself as a-ideological. He claimed to be working solely in accordance with
technocratic objectives, necessary to promoting Russia’s stabilization and then revival.”[16] The same assessment was made by two other analysts, who wrote: “On the whole, however,
Putin—as a staff employee of state security who had spent his whole adult life working
for the KGB under the ideological control of the Communist Party—had no ideology or
political program of his own. He confined himself to general populist phrases. Back
in 1999, at the beginning of his tenure as prime minister, he had given the following
response to a question about his potential platform in the presidential race: ‘My
main objective is to improve people’s lives. We will work out a political platform
later.’”[17]
