Please read Nicolas Tenzer’s essay, “What does Vladimir Putin want?” and the Cosmopolitan Globalists’ introduction to the essay, here. Consider: Does ideology matter? Does Putin have one? Has Nicolas Tenzer correctly identified it? Has he missed any element of it? How much explanatory power do you think his thesis offers? Do you disagree with it? If so, why? Is he correct that our failure to recognize this ideology is the cause of our failure to confront this threat appropriately?
M. Tenzer attempts to argue that the essence of Putinism is irrational metaphysical evil (nihilism). As such, it's a more abstract attack on Putin's Russia than I am familiar with - but perhaps some French readers expect this kind of analysis.
In any case, I think it's nonsense, the geopolitical actions of Russia *do* make perfect sense from a "realist" perspective, e.g. a perspective which asks whether a country will try to prevent an ideologically hostile military bloc (that's NATO) from setting up shop on its border.
The essay reawakens my own hostility towards every part of the western political establishment that wants to reshape the world outside our own borders. Trump or Sanders, Le Pen or Melenchon, let's try anything that will get rid of our liberal imperialists.
Some of the problem is Ukraine is simply more important to Russia that it is to the West. Yes the people in the West like most of the readers here(including myself) very much want to uphold the norm that countries cannot invade other countries but if you look at Ukraine through a pure dollars and cents perspective Ukraine is a far less important of a country to the West than say Finland. Putin knows this and is acting accordingly.
It doesn't matter what motivates a thug or a thuggish system to threaten your life. The solution is always the same. Show your raptor claws. If you don't have any, you will lose your life sooner than later. Those are real animals we are dealing with, make no mistake. Mistakes in this game cost dearly.
Frederick Forsyth says that as far as nations have a character this is what Russians are: moody, oppressed, aggressive. Maybe it can change. Maybe.
Jan 13, 2022·edited Jan 13, 2022Liked by Claire Berlinski
This is an outstanding essay, and the issues raised can be addressed from many directions and for a long time to come. The notion that “might is right” is very, very old… read the Illiad, for example. But it’s more than a notion, it’s an ethic. If you have the physical and mental strength, including guile and cunning, to take it, and to keep it, you deserve it. If you do not have the mental and physical strength to keep it, you are weak, and you deserve to lose it. And of course, it can be anything; your freedom, your country, your wives and husbands, your sons and daughters.
This is a deep and dark seam in human nature, and in the context of a civilised society, it informs the actions and thinking of the criminal mind, from the street punk to organized criminal associations and on down. What our relatively comfortable societies are having difficulty coming to grips with is that this ethic informs the mind of a man who has complete control of the world’s second-largest military. The reasons for our difficulties are myriad, understandable, and may seem insurmountable from inside but not necessarily outside our de facto and imagined walls.
Since Athens, democracies have sometimes – but not always – found the resources to resist and eventually prevail in life and death struggles with the competing ethic of the Sparta of the day, where everything is at risk… although Athens and Sparta might be a bad comparison. More latterly, Ukraine offered a wakeup call eight long years ago, but it seems we weren’t listening, or if we were listening, we didn’t actually, er, respond, apart from token gestures. Time will tell, but it does seem that this time, time is really short.
Jan 13, 2022·edited Jan 13, 2022Liked by Claire Berlinski
Thank you, Claire, and plaudits for publishing a clarion call essay. Thing is, we can wrap an ideology around the the might-is-right ethic to keep academia busy, but when push comes to shove... its optional.
Very interesting take. I would rather drive 50 miles on back roads and be moving than spend 20 minutes on the freeway at dead stop, even though the freeway trip ultimately gets me home quicker. Very irrational. Maybe it’s a male thing. Being in motion has its allure.
I do believe acquiring and maintaining wealth and power are still the ultimate motivators of the individual Russians involved. The acquisition method is indirect. Destroy the current order blocking opportunities for wealth and power and then be alert for opportunities that will periodically and randomly appear in the chaos. It takes a lot of confidence to believe the order can be disturbed enough for one’s own advantage without the chaos engulfing oneself. That might be why they are pushing and probing to disturb the order here and there without doing anything large, yet. I do believe when they perceive an opportunity, they will attempt to capitalize on it.
They may have this confidence because they have an example in their recent history where this worked. When the USSR collapsed, there was chaos which created opportunities for the oligarchs to create their fortunes and for Putin to acquire power. Maybe those currently at the top in Russia feel they have exhausted the internal opportunities and are seeking to create and exploit similar chaotic situations externally. It is a way to keep moving when the internal situation becomes too stable.
I’m no expert on Russia, but people everywhere are more alike than different when the layers are peeled away. The article has a lot of ideas that make sense on first reading. I’m going to come back in a few days and read it again after giving my brain some time to digest.
For me the key sentence in Tenzer’s paper is: “As every tree is known by its fruits, we can understand an ideology through its effects, and the fruit of Putin’s ideology is an upheaval in international relations that forces us to revise the ideas that have until now been our guide.” And the key words are: chaos, motion, and order.
Ken, you mentioned the first two words. I would like to comment on the third. I will use the Russian invasion of Ukraine as the context for my remarks.
Tenzer remarks that “the Russian regime intends to dominate and neutralize Ukraine, preventing it from becoming a free and democratic regime.” In November 2013, Putin acted to keep Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych from signing the Association Agreement with the European Union. Instead, Yanukovych presented an alternative association with the existing Customs Union of Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan. This decision set in motion a revolution in Ukraine and culminated in his overthrow. (The E.U. Association Agreement was signed by the new Ukraine President Petro Poroshenko in June 2014.)
If Putin had the goal of controlling Ukraine, he failed. If his goal was to create chaos in Ukraine and the E.U., he exceeded bigly. The annexation of Crimea; the invasion of Donbas; the shoot down of MH17; the Minsk Agreements; construction of the Kerch Strait Bridge; control of Black Sea shipping; and placing troops on Ukraine borders with Belarus. Moldova, and Russia, have kept the chaos rolling.
Was this what Putin wanted and planned? Was this the result of a series of actions which created chaos in Ukraine? Or was this intended to destroy the foundation of Ukraine?
Tenzer observes that “confronted with an adversary who has no serious goal, the Western world has been unable to think beyond the traditional link between means and end”. He also states that the law - especially international law - “is the greatest obstacle to the concrete application of Putinism”. What has Ukraine done since confronted with Putinism?
I attribute the success of Ukraine in withstanding the chaos of Putinism to its civil society. The Revolution of Dignity in Independence Square was a spontaneous effort, by the Ukrainian people, to counter the tyranny of their government. Through other civil society efforts they:
Protested against failure to sign E.U. Agreement
Formed a volunteer army to stop Russian invasion in eastern Ukraine
Fought against Russian mercenaries in Donbas
Created civil society organizations for social needs
Reinforced norms of international law
Conducted elections for President and Parliament (less Donbas)
Reformed the judiciary to fight corruption
Revamped laws on land ownership
(Countering the annexation of Crimea exceeded the capability of their civil society.)
It is curious that the Putin regime has outlawed foreign and domestic civil society organizations in Russia.
For the best take on Putin, Ukraine and the collapse of the West, take a look at Walter Russell Mead’s opinion piece in today’s Wall Street Journal. He says,
“Neville Chamberlain learned more from failure at Munich than the current generation of Western leaders learned from failure in Crimea. Convinced that the old rules of power politics don’t apply in our enlightened posthistorical century, Europeans nattered on about soft power only to find themselves locked out of key U.S.-Russia talks over Ukraine. As China and Russia grew more powerful and assertive, Americans enthusiastically embraced the politics of mean-spirited polarization and domestic culture wars. Now the Biden administration is simultaneously proclaiming overseas that America is back, in all its order-building awesomeness, and maintaining at home that democracy is one voting-rights bill away from collapse.”
I think it is clear that Putin is operating on the basis on an ideology. It's no nihilism. It's Eurasianism. Read Dugin. It's all there. Note: I am not claiming that Putin is taking orders from Dugin. That would be absurd. Dictators don't take orders from professors. But they do get their ideas from them. https://www.nationalreview.com/2014/03/eurasianist-threat-robert-zubrin/
What struck me in Tenzer's argument was the emphasis on movement. Consider the stifling feeling of immobility. Of stasis. The issue that seems to be plaguing the West is that in the post Cold-war era, we've become atomized and self-absorbed. We navel gaze and accomplish nothing of great import. We developed vaccines in a weekend...then take 9 months of ridiculous caution to release to the public...then have been bowing to conspiracy theorists and avoiding vaccine mandates as if they are not crucial to the survival of the species.
What's frustrating about the West, and freeing about an ideology such as Putinism, is that Putinism offers change. I mean change in the sense that dynamiting a building is a change. But change nonetheless. The West is like a brokerage account, that slowly generates interest if you wisely invest your money after doing your research. Putinism is like gambling, where you go all-in and hit the jackpot or go home with nothing. It's exciting, dynamic. Chaotic and destructive, yes. But easier to manage than intersectional feminism, more "masculine" (uncompromising) than polite capitalism, more rewarding than radical religion.
I think we are wise to take this kind of thing seriously. Putinism will appeal to anyone who is downtrodden, who feels that they can't win with the current system. It's the force behind Trump, behind Brexit, behind all the ways in which our society is unraveling because the rules feel too confining. In the West, we need to find more of a justification for these rules we impose on ourselves. Why is it worth not going to war? It can't just be so that we can travel. And it can't be so that we can get more cheap garbage at Walmart. It has to make us better as a society. We have to really believe that the West is a better way of life.
A lot of this is true but in terms of scientific achievement in most areas the West still stands head and shoulders above Russia. Look at something like the Webb Space Telescope that was just launched in December. Yes it cost a ton of money and was delayed for years but is Russia despite it's own legacy in space even in the ballpark for similar projects in the present day. Absolutely not.
In an American vernacular, you'd describe what he's doing as "trolling." I don't think it's an accident that the Age of the Troll and the Age of Putin are one. A point he might have made, too, is that this is the ideology at which you'd arrive after the failure of all positive ideologies. It's the ideology of the disillusioned.
I mostly agree about Putin, but, good grief, show me that vaccine mandates are essential to "survival of the species". Vaccines are vital- I'm double-jabbed and boosted, I think that those who are not and- very important: also lack natural immunity- are foolish. But that statement about survival of the species is crazy. Neil Ferguson is not smarter than, say, Marty Makary.
Okay okay, I walk it back. The species will likely survive. But allowing viruses time to mutate and develop more deadly variants will lead to many, many unnecessary deaths. Not just COVID, either. Ted Cruz and others are starting to try to dismantle current vaccines mandates for measles, flu, etc. and it's a ball I don't want to see get rolling in our society.
Vaccines mandated for children to attend school for diseases that adversely affect children, are enforced at the state and local level. The Federal government has not legislated itself that power yet. I think state and local is the best place to make these decisions.
In a legal and historical sense you are correct about vaccine mandates being largely enforced at the state and local level however, it was also historically true that all 50 states universally believed in their importance and efficiency with some minimal exceptions.
True, my point was the Cruz and other federal officials currently do not have and should not have the power to dismantle current vaccines mandates that exist at the state level under our current system. Conversely, they don't have and shouldn't have the ability to impose mandates on the states.
This is a feature of, not a bug in, our federalist system. 10th amendment:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people"
Well, Ted Cruz is not exactly a principled political speaker; he's a bit oily and makes a fool of himself an awful lot for a guy with a high IQ. I'd ignore him. But seriously, the COVID Public Health zealots are crying wolf way too much, and hurting the cause of sensible balanced response. You don't need to be a crazy anti-vaxxer to realize that Francis Collins really destroyed his reputational legacy when he tried to shut off debate and censor analyses from very credible people like Jay Bhattacharya and (Oxford, Claire!) Sunetra Gupta. Let's both agree that people should get vaccinated for their own good.
Oxford, yes! I know the place well enough to be confident that very bad ideas can emerge from there just as they can anywhere else. I'm not so impressed.
Sure, no question. Bad ideas can even come out of Cambridge, despite the legacies of Newton and CS Lewis (and my sainted older daughter who spent 12 years there). But the issue I was addressing was whether the Director of NIH should engage in subterfuge to censor public comments by eminently credible scientists- whose opinions right in their fields of expertise- are different. The whole point of Cosmopolitan Globalist would seem to be to invite knowledgeable civilized debate on important topics.
Tenzer doesn’t get Putin at all. Putin may have nihilistic tendencies but ultimately, Putin is a nationalist through and through. He sees the West as debauched and hypocritical (he’s not totally wrong about that). Given the absurd preoccupations dominating debate in the United States and Europe, he sees the West as ripe for the picking. He might be right about that too.
Tenzer missed the mark when he claims that one of Putin’s main objectives is to eviscerate international law. It’s not law that he despises, it’s the sheriff.
Without a sheriff, international law has no meaning. Both Xi in China and Putin in Russia see the West as judge, jury and executioner. The liberal international order (which is the culmination of Enlightenment philosophy born in the West) was imposed on the world in the aftermath of the Second World War over the heads of the Russians and Chinese. Enlightenment values were never ascendant in either of those nations and they have resented that World Order ever since.
The Russians and Chinese are nationalists while the West has spent the better part of the past 80 years pursuing globalism.
But globalism is dying and nationalism is ascendant. Putin and Xi are surely repulsive but sadly, they are on the right side of history.
Either the United States will adapt or it’s greatest days will be in the past. Donald Trump and his foreign policy team understood this viscerally if not intellectually. Joe Biden, Antony Blinken, Jake Sullivan and the rest are living in the past. They’re desperately trying to revive a system that is flatlining. That’s why Putin is winning and the West is losing.
As for Europe, it’s already too late. Europe is toast.
According to the British Medical Journal, the best forecast is that the population of the European Union will fall by a third, to 308 million from 446 million, by the end of this century. Every single nation in the EU has a total fertility rate below replacement. Within a half century, Europe will have 84 citizens above the age of 65 for every 100 citizens. This is a demographic winter of catastrophic proportions. From a demographic point of view, Europe is already dead.
The ability to project power is directly proportional to military strength. From a military point of view, Europe is weaker than its been in half a millennium. The fact that France has the strongest military in Europe is no testament to France’s strength, it’s a testament to Europe’s monumental weakness. Is it any wonder that literally no one cares what Europe thinks about world affairs any more?
Culturally, Europe has turned itself into a backwater. To give you but one example, classical music is Europe’s magnificent gift to the world. Despite this, Europe’s best conservatories would collapse without immigrants from Asia. While Europeans (and Americans) don’t care much about classical music the Chinese, Japanese, Koreans (and Russians) still do.
Matt, compare the number of European students earning engineering degrees with the number of students in Asia earning engineering degrees; Europe is in the verge of becoming an innovation wasteland.
There was a time that Europe was proud to civilize the world through the spread of Christianity. Yes, everyone knows that the history of this evangelism was sordid, but nonetheless, it made Europe influential. Now that the Church pews are empty, European influence is a shell of what it once was.
Now that Europe has substituted worship of the environment for worship of the deity, it faces the reality that its no longer self-reliant when it comes to heating European homes in the winter. Can you think of anything more pathetic than that?
Mr. Tenzer accuses Putin of turning nihilism into an ideology. Maybe he’s partly right. But has he looked in the mirror?
Has Tenzer considered the possibility that Putin (and Xi) are reacting in part to the nihilism that’s overtaken the West?
After all, in the West we no longer even recognize the difference between men and women. According to the ascendant ideology, we’re free to choose our gender as fluidly as we desire. What could be more nihilistic than that, Matt?
Since you asked, I think an actual nihilist is more nihilistic than a trans person. But I would grant that an actual nihilist might be also be trans, so there can be overlap.
I kind of get the sense that your answer to my question was "we're past that point in the timeline," but I'm not sure.
Matt, I did misspeak in my response to you. When I mentioned European demographics, I said, “Europe will have 84 citizens above the age of 65 for every 100 citizens.”
What I meant to say is that Europe will have 84 citizens above the age of 65 for every 100 citizens of working age.
I'm not used to viewing human motivation through this lens, so I'm hesitant to weigh in with anything but caveats. But I certainly cannot deny that influence beliefs hold over behavior. I think I could be more confident in the lens if we could use this model predictively. For example: The next Putinist maneuver will be to cause change and destruction. It will be accompanied by demands that aren't the real objective, because they're more interested in being a thorn than turning profits, and view the chaos as their means of maintaining power. And if we're going to invoke Popper: how could we falsify this?
I suppose my other question is, "Have the Russians acknowledged this?" I feel like Russian pundits and philosophers have always enjoyed bragging about how they've conned the West or figured out some greater truth. If they're conscious of Putinism, how have they been able to resist flaunting it.
Being respected by others can generate or at least underpin self respect. But if respect is not forthcoming, then sometimes fear will do... for a certain mind set, "respect for" and "fear of" are the same thing, and when revenge is involved, the latter trumps the former with a darker satisfaction. Said a bit differently, if Putin had to chose, would he prefer to be respected and even loved, or feared? I wonder.
M. Tenzer attempts to argue that the essence of Putinism is irrational metaphysical evil (nihilism). As such, it's a more abstract attack on Putin's Russia than I am familiar with - but perhaps some French readers expect this kind of analysis.
In any case, I think it's nonsense, the geopolitical actions of Russia *do* make perfect sense from a "realist" perspective, e.g. a perspective which asks whether a country will try to prevent an ideologically hostile military bloc (that's NATO) from setting up shop on its border.
The essay reawakens my own hostility towards every part of the western political establishment that wants to reshape the world outside our own borders. Trump or Sanders, Le Pen or Melenchon, let's try anything that will get rid of our liberal imperialists.
Some of the problem is Ukraine is simply more important to Russia that it is to the West. Yes the people in the West like most of the readers here(including myself) very much want to uphold the norm that countries cannot invade other countries but if you look at Ukraine through a pure dollars and cents perspective Ukraine is a far less important of a country to the West than say Finland. Putin knows this and is acting accordingly.
It doesn't matter what motivates a thug or a thuggish system to threaten your life. The solution is always the same. Show your raptor claws. If you don't have any, you will lose your life sooner than later. Those are real animals we are dealing with, make no mistake. Mistakes in this game cost dearly.
Frederick Forsyth says that as far as nations have a character this is what Russians are: moody, oppressed, aggressive. Maybe it can change. Maybe.
This is an outstanding essay, and the issues raised can be addressed from many directions and for a long time to come. The notion that “might is right” is very, very old… read the Illiad, for example. But it’s more than a notion, it’s an ethic. If you have the physical and mental strength, including guile and cunning, to take it, and to keep it, you deserve it. If you do not have the mental and physical strength to keep it, you are weak, and you deserve to lose it. And of course, it can be anything; your freedom, your country, your wives and husbands, your sons and daughters.
This is a deep and dark seam in human nature, and in the context of a civilised society, it informs the actions and thinking of the criminal mind, from the street punk to organized criminal associations and on down. What our relatively comfortable societies are having difficulty coming to grips with is that this ethic informs the mind of a man who has complete control of the world’s second-largest military. The reasons for our difficulties are myriad, understandable, and may seem insurmountable from inside but not necessarily outside our de facto and imagined walls.
Since Athens, democracies have sometimes – but not always – found the resources to resist and eventually prevail in life and death struggles with the competing ethic of the Sparta of the day, where everything is at risk… although Athens and Sparta might be a bad comparison. More latterly, Ukraine offered a wakeup call eight long years ago, but it seems we weren’t listening, or if we were listening, we didn’t actually, er, respond, apart from token gestures. Time will tell, but it does seem that this time, time is really short.
I thought so, too. The essay really raises important ideas. I'm glad he wrote it and I hope it will be widely read.
Thank you, Claire, and plaudits for publishing a clarion call essay. Thing is, we can wrap an ideology around the the might-is-right ethic to keep academia busy, but when push comes to shove... its optional.
Very interesting take. I would rather drive 50 miles on back roads and be moving than spend 20 minutes on the freeway at dead stop, even though the freeway trip ultimately gets me home quicker. Very irrational. Maybe it’s a male thing. Being in motion has its allure.
I do believe acquiring and maintaining wealth and power are still the ultimate motivators of the individual Russians involved. The acquisition method is indirect. Destroy the current order blocking opportunities for wealth and power and then be alert for opportunities that will periodically and randomly appear in the chaos. It takes a lot of confidence to believe the order can be disturbed enough for one’s own advantage without the chaos engulfing oneself. That might be why they are pushing and probing to disturb the order here and there without doing anything large, yet. I do believe when they perceive an opportunity, they will attempt to capitalize on it.
They may have this confidence because they have an example in their recent history where this worked. When the USSR collapsed, there was chaos which created opportunities for the oligarchs to create their fortunes and for Putin to acquire power. Maybe those currently at the top in Russia feel they have exhausted the internal opportunities and are seeking to create and exploit similar chaotic situations externally. It is a way to keep moving when the internal situation becomes too stable.
I’m no expert on Russia, but people everywhere are more alike than different when the layers are peeled away. The article has a lot of ideas that make sense on first reading. I’m going to come back in a few days and read it again after giving my brain some time to digest.
For me the key sentence in Tenzer’s paper is: “As every tree is known by its fruits, we can understand an ideology through its effects, and the fruit of Putin’s ideology is an upheaval in international relations that forces us to revise the ideas that have until now been our guide.” And the key words are: chaos, motion, and order.
Ken, you mentioned the first two words. I would like to comment on the third. I will use the Russian invasion of Ukraine as the context for my remarks.
Tenzer remarks that “the Russian regime intends to dominate and neutralize Ukraine, preventing it from becoming a free and democratic regime.” In November 2013, Putin acted to keep Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych from signing the Association Agreement with the European Union. Instead, Yanukovych presented an alternative association with the existing Customs Union of Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan. This decision set in motion a revolution in Ukraine and culminated in his overthrow. (The E.U. Association Agreement was signed by the new Ukraine President Petro Poroshenko in June 2014.)
If Putin had the goal of controlling Ukraine, he failed. If his goal was to create chaos in Ukraine and the E.U., he exceeded bigly. The annexation of Crimea; the invasion of Donbas; the shoot down of MH17; the Minsk Agreements; construction of the Kerch Strait Bridge; control of Black Sea shipping; and placing troops on Ukraine borders with Belarus. Moldova, and Russia, have kept the chaos rolling.
Was this what Putin wanted and planned? Was this the result of a series of actions which created chaos in Ukraine? Or was this intended to destroy the foundation of Ukraine?
Tenzer observes that “confronted with an adversary who has no serious goal, the Western world has been unable to think beyond the traditional link between means and end”. He also states that the law - especially international law - “is the greatest obstacle to the concrete application of Putinism”. What has Ukraine done since confronted with Putinism?
I attribute the success of Ukraine in withstanding the chaos of Putinism to its civil society. The Revolution of Dignity in Independence Square was a spontaneous effort, by the Ukrainian people, to counter the tyranny of their government. Through other civil society efforts they:
Protested against failure to sign E.U. Agreement
Formed a volunteer army to stop Russian invasion in eastern Ukraine
Fought against Russian mercenaries in Donbas
Created civil society organizations for social needs
Reinforced norms of international law
Conducted elections for President and Parliament (less Donbas)
Reformed the judiciary to fight corruption
Revamped laws on land ownership
(Countering the annexation of Crimea exceeded the capability of their civil society.)
It is curious that the Putin regime has outlawed foreign and domestic civil society organizations in Russia.
For the best take on Putin, Ukraine and the collapse of the West, take a look at Walter Russell Mead’s opinion piece in today’s Wall Street Journal. He says,
“Neville Chamberlain learned more from failure at Munich than the current generation of Western leaders learned from failure in Crimea. Convinced that the old rules of power politics don’t apply in our enlightened posthistorical century, Europeans nattered on about soft power only to find themselves locked out of key U.S.-Russia talks over Ukraine. As China and Russia grew more powerful and assertive, Americans enthusiastically embraced the politics of mean-spirited polarization and domestic culture wars. Now the Biden administration is simultaneously proclaiming overseas that America is back, in all its order-building awesomeness, and maintaining at home that democracy is one voting-rights bill away from collapse.”
Take a look at the whole essay,
https://www.wsj.com/articles/putin-is-running-rings-around-the-west-ukraine-kazakhstan-troops-border-invasion-russia-11642008206?mod=mhp
I'd love to, but I'm not a subscriber. Perhaps you might consider lending me your copy of the essay? I think that falls under "fair use."
I think it is clear that Putin is operating on the basis on an ideology. It's no nihilism. It's Eurasianism. Read Dugin. It's all there. Note: I am not claiming that Putin is taking orders from Dugin. That would be absurd. Dictators don't take orders from professors. But they do get their ideas from them. https://www.nationalreview.com/2014/03/eurasianist-threat-robert-zubrin/
What struck me in Tenzer's argument was the emphasis on movement. Consider the stifling feeling of immobility. Of stasis. The issue that seems to be plaguing the West is that in the post Cold-war era, we've become atomized and self-absorbed. We navel gaze and accomplish nothing of great import. We developed vaccines in a weekend...then take 9 months of ridiculous caution to release to the public...then have been bowing to conspiracy theorists and avoiding vaccine mandates as if they are not crucial to the survival of the species.
What's frustrating about the West, and freeing about an ideology such as Putinism, is that Putinism offers change. I mean change in the sense that dynamiting a building is a change. But change nonetheless. The West is like a brokerage account, that slowly generates interest if you wisely invest your money after doing your research. Putinism is like gambling, where you go all-in and hit the jackpot or go home with nothing. It's exciting, dynamic. Chaotic and destructive, yes. But easier to manage than intersectional feminism, more "masculine" (uncompromising) than polite capitalism, more rewarding than radical religion.
I think we are wise to take this kind of thing seriously. Putinism will appeal to anyone who is downtrodden, who feels that they can't win with the current system. It's the force behind Trump, behind Brexit, behind all the ways in which our society is unraveling because the rules feel too confining. In the West, we need to find more of a justification for these rules we impose on ourselves. Why is it worth not going to war? It can't just be so that we can travel. And it can't be so that we can get more cheap garbage at Walmart. It has to make us better as a society. We have to really believe that the West is a better way of life.
But right now, we insist on hating ourselves.
A lot of this is true but in terms of scientific achievement in most areas the West still stands head and shoulders above Russia. Look at something like the Webb Space Telescope that was just launched in December. Yes it cost a ton of money and was delayed for years but is Russia despite it's own legacy in space even in the ballpark for similar projects in the present day. Absolutely not.
In an American vernacular, you'd describe what he's doing as "trolling." I don't think it's an accident that the Age of the Troll and the Age of Putin are one. A point he might have made, too, is that this is the ideology at which you'd arrive after the failure of all positive ideologies. It's the ideology of the disillusioned.
I mostly agree about Putin, but, good grief, show me that vaccine mandates are essential to "survival of the species". Vaccines are vital- I'm double-jabbed and boosted, I think that those who are not and- very important: also lack natural immunity- are foolish. But that statement about survival of the species is crazy. Neil Ferguson is not smarter than, say, Marty Makary.
Okay okay, I walk it back. The species will likely survive. But allowing viruses time to mutate and develop more deadly variants will lead to many, many unnecessary deaths. Not just COVID, either. Ted Cruz and others are starting to try to dismantle current vaccines mandates for measles, flu, etc. and it's a ball I don't want to see get rolling in our society.
Vaccines mandated for children to attend school for diseases that adversely affect children, are enforced at the state and local level. The Federal government has not legislated itself that power yet. I think state and local is the best place to make these decisions.
In a legal and historical sense you are correct about vaccine mandates being largely enforced at the state and local level however, it was also historically true that all 50 states universally believed in their importance and efficiency with some minimal exceptions.
True, my point was the Cruz and other federal officials currently do not have and should not have the power to dismantle current vaccines mandates that exist at the state level under our current system. Conversely, they don't have and shouldn't have the ability to impose mandates on the states.
This is a feature of, not a bug in, our federalist system. 10th amendment:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people"
Well, Ted Cruz is not exactly a principled political speaker; he's a bit oily and makes a fool of himself an awful lot for a guy with a high IQ. I'd ignore him. But seriously, the COVID Public Health zealots are crying wolf way too much, and hurting the cause of sensible balanced response. You don't need to be a crazy anti-vaxxer to realize that Francis Collins really destroyed his reputational legacy when he tried to shut off debate and censor analyses from very credible people like Jay Bhattacharya and (Oxford, Claire!) Sunetra Gupta. Let's both agree that people should get vaccinated for their own good.
Oxford, yes! I know the place well enough to be confident that very bad ideas can emerge from there just as they can anywhere else. I'm not so impressed.
Sure, no question. Bad ideas can even come out of Cambridge, despite the legacies of Newton and CS Lewis (and my sainted older daughter who spent 12 years there). But the issue I was addressing was whether the Director of NIH should engage in subterfuge to censor public comments by eminently credible scientists- whose opinions right in their fields of expertise- are different. The whole point of Cosmopolitan Globalist would seem to be to invite knowledgeable civilized debate on important topics.
Thank you both for that exchange. Too rarely seen on the internet.
Tenzer doesn’t get Putin at all. Putin may have nihilistic tendencies but ultimately, Putin is a nationalist through and through. He sees the West as debauched and hypocritical (he’s not totally wrong about that). Given the absurd preoccupations dominating debate in the United States and Europe, he sees the West as ripe for the picking. He might be right about that too.
Tenzer missed the mark when he claims that one of Putin’s main objectives is to eviscerate international law. It’s not law that he despises, it’s the sheriff.
Without a sheriff, international law has no meaning. Both Xi in China and Putin in Russia see the West as judge, jury and executioner. The liberal international order (which is the culmination of Enlightenment philosophy born in the West) was imposed on the world in the aftermath of the Second World War over the heads of the Russians and Chinese. Enlightenment values were never ascendant in either of those nations and they have resented that World Order ever since.
The Russians and Chinese are nationalists while the West has spent the better part of the past 80 years pursuing globalism.
But globalism is dying and nationalism is ascendant. Putin and Xi are surely repulsive but sadly, they are on the right side of history.
Either the United States will adapt or it’s greatest days will be in the past. Donald Trump and his foreign policy team understood this viscerally if not intellectually. Joe Biden, Antony Blinken, Jake Sullivan and the rest are living in the past. They’re desperately trying to revive a system that is flatlining. That’s why Putin is winning and the West is losing.
As for Europe, it’s already too late. Europe is toast.
What will be the mark on the timeline where you would consider Europe to be declared dead?
According to the British Medical Journal, the best forecast is that the population of the European Union will fall by a third, to 308 million from 446 million, by the end of this century. Every single nation in the EU has a total fertility rate below replacement. Within a half century, Europe will have 84 citizens above the age of 65 for every 100 citizens. This is a demographic winter of catastrophic proportions. From a demographic point of view, Europe is already dead.
The ability to project power is directly proportional to military strength. From a military point of view, Europe is weaker than its been in half a millennium. The fact that France has the strongest military in Europe is no testament to France’s strength, it’s a testament to Europe’s monumental weakness. Is it any wonder that literally no one cares what Europe thinks about world affairs any more?
Culturally, Europe has turned itself into a backwater. To give you but one example, classical music is Europe’s magnificent gift to the world. Despite this, Europe’s best conservatories would collapse without immigrants from Asia. While Europeans (and Americans) don’t care much about classical music the Chinese, Japanese, Koreans (and Russians) still do.
Matt, compare the number of European students earning engineering degrees with the number of students in Asia earning engineering degrees; Europe is in the verge of becoming an innovation wasteland.
There was a time that Europe was proud to civilize the world through the spread of Christianity. Yes, everyone knows that the history of this evangelism was sordid, but nonetheless, it made Europe influential. Now that the Church pews are empty, European influence is a shell of what it once was.
Now that Europe has substituted worship of the environment for worship of the deity, it faces the reality that its no longer self-reliant when it comes to heating European homes in the winter. Can you think of anything more pathetic than that?
Mr. Tenzer accuses Putin of turning nihilism into an ideology. Maybe he’s partly right. But has he looked in the mirror?
Has Tenzer considered the possibility that Putin (and Xi) are reacting in part to the nihilism that’s overtaken the West?
After all, in the West we no longer even recognize the difference between men and women. According to the ascendant ideology, we’re free to choose our gender as fluidly as we desire. What could be more nihilistic than that, Matt?
Since you asked, I think an actual nihilist is more nihilistic than a trans person. But I would grant that an actual nihilist might be also be trans, so there can be overlap.
I kind of get the sense that your answer to my question was "we're past that point in the timeline," but I'm not sure.
Matt, I did misspeak in my response to you. When I mentioned European demographics, I said, “Europe will have 84 citizens above the age of 65 for every 100 citizens.”
What I meant to say is that Europe will have 84 citizens above the age of 65 for every 100 citizens of working age.
It’s still really bad.
Sorry for the mistake.
Got it. Thanks for the honest effort.
I would support the proposition.
It makes me wonder if this is the question we should ask of any political movement that fell under the influence of a personality cult?
Stalinism stemming from Communism? Trumpism born of the Republican party?
What about the specifics of this ideology? Has he correctly identified them, do you think?
I'm not used to viewing human motivation through this lens, so I'm hesitant to weigh in with anything but caveats. But I certainly cannot deny that influence beliefs hold over behavior. I think I could be more confident in the lens if we could use this model predictively. For example: The next Putinist maneuver will be to cause change and destruction. It will be accompanied by demands that aren't the real objective, because they're more interested in being a thorn than turning profits, and view the chaos as their means of maintaining power. And if we're going to invoke Popper: how could we falsify this?
I suppose my other question is, "Have the Russians acknowledged this?" I feel like Russian pundits and philosophers have always enjoyed bragging about how they've conned the West or figured out some greater truth. If they're conscious of Putinism, how have they been able to resist flaunting it.
But why does behavior of this kind lead Russians to feel self-respect?
Being respected by others can generate or at least underpin self respect. But if respect is not forthcoming, then sometimes fear will do... for a certain mind set, "respect for" and "fear of" are the same thing, and when revenge is involved, the latter trumps the former with a darker satisfaction. Said a bit differently, if Putin had to chose, would he prefer to be respected and even loved, or feared? I wonder.