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| 31 октября, 2012 | | | Читать на сайте издания |
Kremlin to outsource analysis
'Gazeta.ru' publication
By Ekaterina Vinokurova
The Kremlin has set up four research foundations whose job it will be to collect unaffiliated information in society.
The Kremlin will also change the way it works with experts. It wants to attract specialists to work on state projects, and to that end is setting up specialist Foundations. The government wants independent information and analysis, particularly about the electoral habits of Russians. But according to an expert source contacted by Gazeta, these measures will hardly help.
Work for expert analysis will be partially outsourced by the President’s Office (Administratsiya Presidenta, AP) according to experts and sources within the administration.
Immediately after the return to power of Vladimir Putin, the new deputy head of domestic politics, Dimitri Badovski, was entrusted with the task of contacting independent experts. Badovski previously worked as a political analyst at the Institute of social systems. He left the AP (President’s Office) in August of this year and today heads one of the newly created Foundations, called the Institute of Socio-Economic and Political Studies. After the departure of the bureaucrat from the Adminstration, his post remained vacant but now there’s been a complete re-organisation of the way experts work with the government. “The focus will shift to the Foundations,” several experts immediately told Gazeta. “The administration for domestic policy will become their customers.”
To facilitate this, four Foundations have been created. They will carry out research for the authorities and will interact directly with experts and think-tanks.
Alexei Chesnakov, deputy secretary of the Presidium of the General Council for a United Russia, explains: “As far as I know, at present four Foundations are planned: the Foundation for the Development of Civil Society (headed by Konstantin Kostin), the Institute of Socio-Economic and Political Studies (with Dmitri Badovsky at its head), a Foundation set up by the United Russia delegate Valery Galchenko, and finally the Research Institute of Ruslan Gattarov. Working in parallel with them, other long-standing agencies who have proved their worth over the years will continue to be used, for example, the Agency for Political and Economic Communication headed by Dmitri Orlov.”
Chesnakov himself heads another Foundation, the Center for Political Studies in Russia, which, he says, “will as before aim to fulfil individual requests for help from Foundations and as far as possible will do research for United Russia which is already under pressure doing its own research projects on party issues.”
In addition to conducting research and encouraging interaction between a pool of political scientists doing Foundation work, there will be an attempt to widen the net of experts and increase their number. “The number of existing experts is extremely limited, we need new blood,” a source close to the leadership of United Russia told Gazeta.
“The regrouping of forces and the search for new experts – it is all linked to the fact that these things are being planned,” confirms Gazeta’s source in the President’s Administration.
Each Foundation will have its own area of expertise. Kostin’s Foundation will do research into anything connected with elections, political parties, the public mood. So, for example, there was a report published recently on the regional elections on the 14th of October and on the results of those elections.”We bring in experts for specific projects, and our Foundation acts as a funder for various research projects,” Kostin says, explaining his organisation’s links with professionals.
The Institute headed by Badovski is linked with the All-Russian People’s Front. “Its work will include being an expert platform for dialogue between representatives of this organisation, and it will also do research work, attracting in all those ‘frontline soldiers’ as experts,” Badovski told Gazeta. “Of course, apart from working with experts from the ONF, we will try and find new experts. Initially, we’ll look for them in the regions, and will start by targeting different groups: political scientists, mass media, members of regional legislatures.”
The Gattarov Foundation will concentrate on research linked to the internet and social networking, and the Galchenko Foundation plans to do research into municipal elections.
One of the reasons why the Kremlin has decided to distance itself from experts and focus on fundamental research (apart from searching for new faces in the professional community) is because of the need for independent, unbiased research, say representatives of Gazeta.
A source close to the President’s administration at Gazeta adds that there will inevitably be competition between the Foundations, something the President’s office views with equanimity.
“In the past few years, the president’s administration has been the major customer for basic research. That’s where the demand is, that’s where you find clever and engaged people,” says Chesnakov. “The authorities did try and monitor various trends, but never used a proper scientific , in-depth approach, so a real examination of a question simply didn’t happen.” According to him, today’s reorganisation of experts is the first step towards creating proper, in-depth research, including qualitative research, analysis of electoral statistics, and the study of electoral psychology.
“At last, yet another reason for the re-organisation of experts,” concludes Chesnakov, “the need for the government to have objective research is often critical. Sometimes research, done on the direct order of the government, can lead, in the first place, to a similar point of view on the part of the person doing the research.” He admits: “It would be difficult to be fully independent in their research,” and goes on: “Perhaps one of the few who have tried to give an objective picture using universal methods of working with a broad spectrum of information, is the Foundation for Effective Politics.”
The head of the Foundation for Effective Politics, Gleb Pavlovski, explains the Kremlin’s change in attitude towards experts: “It’s not because they want an objective picture of reality. It’s just an attempt to take critical discussion of what’s happening beyond the walls of the Kremlin.”
He continues: “The idea is this: say that outside the Kremlin wall, some issue is being discussed and a ready-made solution found. The paradox is that in the Kremlin itself there is no one able to evaluate those recommendations, though the head of the administration, his deputies, the head of the department of internal politics, they should all be analysts, it’s part of their job. To outsource scientific and intellectual work is, frankly, a bad idea. You could compare it to the following situation: imagine there’s an election campaign going on and the party staff don’t themselves discuss strategy but order someone outside to plan it for them. “
“The only advantage of such a scheme,” says Pavlovski, “is a financial one, reducing the need for parallel “black accountants”.
Political analyst Marina Litvinovich is also sceptical about the potential results of this scheme. “All these Foundations are somehow or other still affiliated with the Kremlin, so it’s unlikely that they will give objective information,” she says. “I don’t think that the present government is as interested in it as it tries to make out: those times have passed.”
Finally, there’s a lack of clarity about whether the tendering for research projects will be open or closed, and furthermore, whether those reports made by the four Foundations close to the Kremlin will be made public. There are also questions about whether the Kremlin will succeed in attracting truly independent experts. Information received by Gazeta suggests that as recently as February 2012 a whole series of meetings took place between the administration and independent political analysts who asked not to be identified. The analysts refused to cooperate, but according to Gazeta, the government is not about to change its position as regards the new scheme.
