Russian round robin

Heads of government who are not quite their own masters seem to be growing in number. First it was India, now it is Russia that will have this odd arrangement where real political power resides in someone other than the person formally authorised to wield it. But there, large as it might be, the similarity ends. The election of Dmitri Medvedev as president "" if one can really call it that "" was a foregone conclusion. He had been chosen to hold that office "" he was the deputy prime minister "" by the outgoing president, Vladimir Putin. Mr Medvedev is only 42. He has never held elected office, and has been in Mr Putin's shadow for more than 15 years. He has no power base. And Mr Putin, as prime minister-designate, has made no bones about who the real boss of Russia will be. He is taking a step down in the Russian hierarchy because the Constitution limits his term as president to eight years, but expects that not to matter. It will be interesting to see what Mr Medvedev makes of this arrangement. Will he at some point rebel against Mr Putin "" he has the constitutional authority to sack him "" or will he accept this anomalous situation where he must continue to reside in Mr Putin's shadow? Although only time will tell, Russia is going to try out an interesting experiment.

Mr Putin brought much-needed stability to Russia in the eight years that he ruled it. His predecessor had been erratic, and so Russia and millions of Russians had been bankrupted. Mr Putin was also lucky. Recall that, in 1998, oil had fallen to $10 per barrel, as against $100 now. And it helped politically that he had the state security apparatus behind him. This enabled him to do a sort of Colonel Sleeman vs the Thugs act in Russia. Ever higher oil prices made things easier for him economically with GDP growing at nearly 7 per cent each year, and this also facilitated a more muscular foreign policy stance. However, there is the argument that, for all the fortunate circumstances that came his way, Mr Putin did less well in Russia than many other ex-Soviet republics during the same period. And though he remains very popular, there is the obvious criticism that his authoritarian actions (like virtually decimating a free press and any real opposition) are not to Russia's long-term benefit.

Mr Medvedev has been projected as more liberal than Mr Putin. Will he able to loosen the KGB-like control over the lives of Russians that Mr Putin had re-introduced? He has spoken about freedom in a way that the KGB does not understand, and of the need to strengthen non-personal institutions. He is also supposed to be more favourably inclined to the West, which has grown to dislike Mr Putin. The big question, therefore, is whether the new arrangement is going to be about Mr Medvedev or Mr Putin. If the latter, the former will play possum, perhaps throughout his term. If not, he could start to assert himself in ways that do not annoy Mr Putin to the point where he decides that enough is enough. On the other hand, it is Mr Putin who hand-picked Mr Medvedev to be his successor. Could it be that Mr Putin himself recognises the need for some change in the country's internal and external policies?