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Kamil Galeev Profile picture
@kamilkazani
Feb 20, 2023 • 8 tweets • 3 min read • Read on X
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We, the People

During the Ottoman coup of 1913 Enver Bey demanded the Grand Vizier (Prime Minister) Kamil Pasha to write a letter of resignation

- At the suggestion of the military… - Kamil Pasha started
- … and the people, - corrected Enver
- … and the people, - added Kamil Image
“The People” = an abstraction legitimizing the will of an interest group. Enver just can’t walk around giving orders by the name of sweet himself. No, he will be giving orders by someone else’s name

“The People” will suffice Image
Someone else could be speaking on behalf of God...
... Or a dead ancestor (a more Lindy choice, I think). Consider Kadyrov. The current ruler of Chechnya Ramzan is building a massive cult of personality of his father Ahmad, rather than of himself. The posters with Ahmad are everywhere. Everything is named in honour of Ahmad Image
Speaking on your own behalf = weak
Speaking on a dead ancestor's behalf = powerful

The ancestor is dead, won't say or do anything, so he is nothing more than an abstraction legitimising whatever you do

Build an ancestral cult -> Then borrow a symbolic power from it

Very smart Image
Legitimising your rule through the appeal to something larger than yourself is a necessity. Unless you wanna be hated

As Guizot pointed out, the despotic monarchies or theocracies were often popular among their subjects. Whereas the feudal despotism was always universally hated Image
A man exercising power by the name of idea (monarchy/theocracy) can be often acceptable or popular

A man exercising power by the name of himself (feudal) is always hated

Therefore, a rational ruler will find/create an abstraction to speak on its behalf

gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt… Image
I quoted the Enver Bey vs Kamil Pasha dialogue by memory, but it is basically from this book, which I absolutely recommend. Enjoyed it very much Image

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More from @kamilkazani

Kamil Galeev Profile picture
May 2
Fake jobs are completely normal & totally natural. The reason is: nobody understands what is happening and most certainly does not understand why. Like people, including the upper management have some idea of what is happening in an organisation, and this idea is usually wrong.
As they do not know and cannot know causal relations between the input and output, they just try to increase some sort of input, in a hope for a better output, but they do not really know which input to increase.
Insiders with deep & specific knowledge, on the other hand, may have a more clear & definite idea of what is happening, and even certain, non zero degree of understanding of causal links between the input and output

(what kind of input produces this kind of output)
Read 6 tweets
Kamil Galeev Profile picture
Apr 12
There is a common argument that due process belongs only to citizens

Citizens deserve it, non citizens don’t

And, therefore, can be dealt with extrajudicially

That is a perfectly logical, internally consistent position

Now let’s think through its implications
IF citizens have the due process, and non-citizens don’t

THEN we have two parallel systems of justice

One slow, cumbersome, subject to open discussion and to appeal (due process)

Another swift, expedient, and subject neither to a discussion nor to an appeal (extrajudicial)
And the second one already encompasses tens of millions of non citizens living in the United States, legal and illegal, residents or not.

Now the question would be:

Which system is more convenient for those in power?

Well, the answer is obvious
Read 10 tweets
Kamil Galeev Profile picture
Apr 5
I have recently read someone comparing Trump’s tariffs with collectivisation in the USSR. I think it is an interesting comparison. I don’t think it is exactly the same thing of course. But I indeed think that Stalin’s collectivisation offers an interesting metaphor, a perspective to think aboutImage
But let’s make a crash intro first

1. The thing you need to understand about the 1920s USSR is that it was an oligarchic regime. It was not strictly speaking, an autocracy. It was a power of few grandees, of the roughly equal rank.
2. Although Joseph Stalin established himself as the single most influential grandee by 1925, that did not make him a dictator. He was simply the most important guy out there. Otherwise, he was just one of a few. He was not yet the God Emperor he would become later.
Read 30 tweets
Kamil Galeev Profile picture
Mar 16
The great delusion about popular revolts is that they are provoked by bad conditions of life, and burst out when they exacerbate. Nothing can be further from truth. For the most part, popular revolts do not happen when things get worse. They occur when things turn for the better
This may sound paradoxical and yet, may be easy to explain. When the things had been really, really, really bad, the masses were too weak, to scared and too depressed to even think of raising their head. If they beared any grudges and grievances, they beared them in silence.
When things turn for the better, that is when the people see a chance to restore their pride and agency, and to take revenge for all the past grudges, and all the past fear. As a result, a turn for the better not so much pacifies the population as emboldens and radicalises it.
Read 6 tweets
Kamil Galeev Profile picture
Mar 1
Three years of the war have passed

So, let’s recall what has happened so far

The first thing to understand about the Russian-Ukrainian war is that Russia did not plan a war. And it, most certainly, did not plan the protracted hostilities of the kind we are seeing today Image
This entire war is the regime change gone wrong.

Russia did not want a protracted war (no one does). It wanted to replace the government in Kyiv, put Ukraine under control and closely integrate it with Russia

(Operation Danube style) Image
One thing to understand is that Russia viewed Ukraine as a considerable asset. From the Russian perspective, it was a large and populous country populated by what was (again, from the Russian perspective) effectively the same people. Assimilatable, integratable, recruitable Image
Read 32 tweets
Kamil Galeev Profile picture
Feb 8
Why does Russia attack?

In 1991, Moscow faced two disobedient ethnic republics: Chechnya and Tatarstan. Both were the Muslim majority autonomies that refused to sign the Federation Treaty (1992), insisting on full sovereignty. In both cases, Moscow was determined to quell them. Image
Still, the final outcome could not be more different. Chechnya was invaded, its towns razed to the ground, its leader assassinated. Tatarstan, on the other hand, managed to sign a favourable agreement with Moscow that lasted until Putin’s era.

The question is - why. Image
Retrospectively, this course of events (obliterate Chechnya, negotiate with Tatarstan) may seem predetermined. But it was not considered as such back then. For many, including many of Yeltsin’s own partisans it came as a surprise, or perhaps even as a betrayal.

Let's see why Image
Read 24 tweets

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