On January 23, 2021, Moscow, Russia, people hold a parade and rally
After Crimea entered Russia in 2014, under the background of the normalization of Western sanctions and low international energy prices, Russia's GDP fell from US$2 trillion to US$1.3 trillion. Since then, thanks to the large-scale development of agriculture and the stimulating effect of more than 50% of domestic demand on economic growth, the Russian economy has gradually emerged from the bottom. However, the new crown epidemic has once again plunged the Russian economy into a dark moment.
Due to the economic recession triggered by the epidemic, anti-Putin videos released by the opposition, and the high number of new crown virus infections, the reputation of Russia's Putin regime has suffered a serious impact, but the new crown vaccine "satellite-V" leads the world and even Germany wants to introduce help Next, the wind reviews gradually improved.
"Economic Curse"
In 2020, Russia's economy shrank by 3.1%. The epidemic has sharply reduced the economic activity of various industries, and its impact is even greater than the 2008 financial crisis. This means that the first economic crisis in the third decade of the 21st century has arrived, and the curse that Russia will suffer an economic crisis every 10 years after the disintegration of the Soviet Union continues again.
The deteriorating economic situation has prompted the Russian government to release epidemic prevention and restrictive measures relatively quickly. Russia's strictest isolation measures lasted less than two months, which is far shorter than that of European and American countries. Russian officials attribute this to the characteristics of Russia’s economic structure: raw material mining and primary processing sectors account for a large proportion, and end consumer goods production sectors and small and medium-sized enterprises account for a low proportion. This makes Russia’s stress response to epidemic prevention measures weaker and the Russian economy The degree of damage is therefore lower. Nevertheless, fear of the economic crisis is still the main reason for the Russian government to lower the level of epidemic prevention.
Under the anti-epidemic measures, traditional export industries such as oil and gas exploration, metallurgy, machinery and equipment have been severely impacted. Since the sum of oil and gas export revenue and non-oil and gas import revenue (duties, etc.) exceeds half of the Russian Federation’s budget revenue, oil export revenue in 2020 will decrease by more than 40% year-on-year, non-oil and gas import revenue will fall by 7.4%, and anti-crisis funds such as epidemic prevention and control At the time of large expenditures, the budget deficit rate of the Russian Federation exceeded the official economic safety threshold.
The socio-economic stagnation under the blockade order, in particular, has greatly affected the lives of private enterprises, workers, and low-income groups. The specific manifestations are as follows: on the one hand, inflation has increased, and residents’ real income has fallen; on the other hand, the economy has stalled. As a result, the unemployment rate has risen sharply, and the phenomenon of “shadow unemployment” has spread-that is, some people face wage arrears and shortened working hours even though they keep their jobs.
Even though the Russian government has introduced a series of supportive policies such as loans for small and medium enterprises to prevent large numbers of layoffs in enterprises, rising prices have still worsened the lives of some people. In February 2021, Russia's inflation rate soared from 5.2% in January to 5.7%, the highest inflation rate since November 2016.
After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the curse that Russia will suffer an economic crisis every 10 years continues again.
In addition, Russia’s external economic environment is particularly severe. The priority foreign policy of the new US Biden administration is to repair relations with European allies, NATO has been substantially restored, and the consistency of the US and Europe's positions on Russia has risen sharply; in addition, the US pressure plan for the "Beixi-2" project is basically Confirmed, and Biden’s traditional Cold War mentality against Russia on the Ukrainian issue, Western countries will continue to impose economic and technological containment on Russia through sanctions and restrictions on trade, investment, finance, and technology in the economic field.
Compared with sanctions, the impact of the epidemic itself on the Russian economy is still controllable. Russia currently does not have the bankruptcy risk of countries in South America, the Middle East and other regions. On the one hand, productivity has not been severely damaged. Gross domestic product, imports and exports, and budget deficits are all dynamic indicators that are easier to recover and adjust; on the other hand, Russia’s national leverage ratio is small, foreign exchange reserves are sufficient, and trade surpluses. The indicators are still in a sustainable or even optimal state. After the country implements reasonable fiscal, currency, and investment countercyclical policies, the prospects for Russia's economic recovery are promising.
Two protests
Social dissatisfaction is most likely to breed during periods of economic change. In January 2021, large-scale demonstrations took place in many places in Russia. The fuse was that the opposition leader Alexei Navalny was arrested after being poisoned and returned to Russia, and released the investigation video "The Palace for Putin: The History of the Greatest Bribery" on his personal website and YouTube.
The video has been viewed 55 million times within 3 days of its release. Then the opposition mobilized demonstrations on social platforms. The protesters were mostly young people and college students under the age of 35 with low social status. They played "freedom", "release", "I love Russia", "we are waiting for change", and "I am for everyone," during the October Revolution. The slogan of "Everyone is for me", or the slogan of "Down with the Tsar" and "Shameful".
On November 15, 2018, the "Beixi-2" natural gas pipeline project is being laid in the Baltic region of northeastern Germany
From the perspective of social movement elements such as organizational methods, participant structure, and discourse, this collective action has no specific or radical political demands. The political identities of the protesters are relatively weakened, with only 3% carrying protest slogans, and there is no clear left-center-right or nationalist division. Except for a few protesters who are opposition supporters, most of the protesters are really "free riders"—that is, they mainly express dissatisfaction with the current economic situation and corruption, and vent the depression and accumulation of strict epidemic prevention restrictions since April 2020. pressure.
Therefore, the collective action was relatively mild. The protesters’ "attacks" on the police were limited to throwing snowballs and bottles, and the police arrests were only targeted at radicals and key figures of the opposition group for acts that disrupt public order. The protest movement only happened twice, and the intensity quickly decayed.
