Tourism issue is not just tourism issue. Russian public opinion interprets it as the marker of the *real* attitude of Europe. When Macron/Scholz express a deep concern, Russian public either laughs over it or interprets it as the de facto endorsement. Empty words, no action
Visa ban may be a small action, but it is an action. Unlike words visa ban has nonzero value. This can and will be interpreted as Europe being *actually* upset about what's happening in Ukraine and probably even somewhat angry. It's a sign of actual, unironic disapproval
When you read complaints about the visa ban, keep in mind that when Russia attacked Georgia in 2008 the future leader of opposition Navalny called for deportation of all Georgians (whom he called "rodents") from Russia.
To sum up. Any signs of business as usual, including tourism, are viewed as acceptance/endorsement of Russia's policies. Russian people are no idiots. They get that if Russia's behaviour is unpunished, it means Russia got away with it. Putin is genius, his critics are imbeciles
European policies, including the visa policies have a great impact on the Russian discourse and internal politics. The better life in Russia will be, the more business as usual continues, the more Russian population will believe that everything's fine. Just chill down
Russia is extremely pragmatic and individualistic culture. Extremely. Considerations of abstract morals or humanism have *negative* value here, they're nearly universally mocked. Considerations of personal comfort and pleasure have enormous value, far more than in the West
Personal comfort is much more of a political factor in Russia than in Western Europe. If we don't feel significant discomfort, that means Putin is 100% right. It's personal comfort or discomfort that determines support of Kremlin or lack of it, not some BS moral considerations
To sum up, Russian public opinion is not influenced by pictures of the dead, of destroyed cities, of the cut off heads and hands. Nobody gives a fuck. They do give a fuck about personal comfort though. And the level of comfort directly correlates with the support of regime
If you want Kremlin to go on, minimise the personal discomofort of the Russian population. If you want Kremlin to reconsider, you need to act the other way around. Even small actions like stopping tourism have huge political significance as markers of *real* attitude of Europe
Saying all of this, I find it very important to keep a one way door to *somewhere* open for the Russian citizens who want to leave. I also think it's very important to work out a viable way of surrender with a green corridor to somewhere for the Russian soldiers in Ukraine
Effect will be non-linear. I don't think that the bulk of Russian forces will surrender. They won't or at least they won't for now. But even 1% of troops actually surrendering will have a huge damaging effect on the morals, destroying the mutual trust and arousing suspicion
Add to that reasonable monetary payments for sabotage guaranteed by rich countries/organisations and it may have a paralysing effect on the fighting force. All social systems operate on trust and that will be destroying it, especially when the first saboteurs get their payment
NB: these guarantees should be made by *rich* countries or institutions. Slavs don't believe in Slavic financial guarantees, but they do believe in the Western ones. German financial guarantee is way better than the Ukrainian one in this regard. The end
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There's a subtle point here that 99,999% of Western commentariat is missing. Like, totally blind to. And that point is:
Building a huuuuuuuuuuge dam (or steel plant, or whatever) has been EVERYONE's plan of development. Like absolutely every developing country, no exceptions
Almost everyone who tried to develop did it in a USSR-ish way, via prestige projects. Build a dam. A steel plant. A huge plant. And then an even bigger one
And then you run out of money, and it all goes bust and all you have is postapocalyptic ruins for the kids to play in
If China did not go bust, in a way like almost every development project from the USSR to South Asia did, that probably means that you guys are wrong about China. Like totally wrong
What you describe is not China but the USSR, and its copies & emulations elsewhere
What I am saying is that "capitalist reforms" are a buzzword devoid of any actual meaning, and a buzzword that obfuscated rather than explains. Specifically, it is fusing radically different policies taken under the radically different circumstances (and timing!) into one - purely for ideological purposes
It can be argued, for example, that starting from the 1980s, China has undertaken massive socialist reforms, specifically in infrastructure, and in basic (mother) industries, such as steel, petrochemical and chemical and, of course, power
The primary weakness of this argument is that being true, historically speaking, it is just false in the context of American politics where the “communism” label has been so over-used (and misapplied) that it lost all of its former power:
“We want X”
“No, that is communism”
“We want communism”
Basically, when you use a label like “communism” as a deus ex machina winning you every argument, you simultaneously re-define its meaning. And when you use it to beat off every popular socio economic demand (e.g. universal healthcare), you re-define communism as a synthesis of all the popular socio economic demands
Historical communism = forced industrial development in a poor, predominantly agrarian country, funded through expropriation of the peasantry
(With the most disastrous economic and humanitarian consequences)
Many are trying to explain his success with some accidental factors such as his “personal charisma”, Cuomo's weakness etc
Still, I think there may be some fundamental factors here. A longue durée shift, and a very profound one
1. Public outrage does not work anymore
If you look at Zohran, he is calm, constructive, and rarely raises his voice. I think one thing that Mamdani - but almost no one else in the American political space is getting - is that the public is getting tired of the outrage
Outrage, anger, righteous indignation have all been the primary drivers of American politics for quite a while
For a while, this tactics worked
Indeed, when everyone around is polite, and soft (and insincere), freaking out was a smart thing to do. It could help you get noticed
People don’t really understand causal links. We pretend we do (“X results in Y”). But we actually don’t. Most explanations (= descriptions of causal structures) are fake.
There may be no connection between X and Y at all. The cause is just misattributed.
Or, perhaps, X does indeed result in Y. but only under a certain (and unknown!) set of conditions that remains totally and utterly opaque to us. So, X->Y is only a part of the equation
And so on
I like to think of a hypothetical Stone Age farmer who started farming, and it worked amazingly, and his entire community adopted his lifestyle, and many generations followed it and prospered and multiplied, until all suddenly wiped out in a new ice age
1. Normative Islamophobia that used to define the public discourse being the most acceptable form of racial & ethnic bigotry in the West, is receding. It is not so much dying as rather - failing to replicate. It is not that the old people change their views as that the young do not absorb their prejudice any longer.
In fact, I incline to think it has been failing to replicate for a while, it is just that we have not been paying attention
Again, the change of vibe does not happen at once. The Muslim scare may still find (some) audience among the more rigid elderly, who are not going to change their views. But for the youth, it is starting to sound as archaic as the Catholic scare of know nothings
Out of date
2. What is particularly interesting regarding Mamdani's victory, is his support base. It would not be much of an exaggeration to say that its core is comprised of the young (and predominantly white) middle classes, with a nearly equal representation of men and women