Putin and the Protesters
The Agenda for the next Presidency
Hosted by: AIIA NSW
The event will start on: Tuesday, 07 February 2012 6:00 PM
And will end on: Tuesday, 07 February 2012 7:30 PM
At The Glover Cottages, Sydney
Posted by: nsw
Of all the developments that will attract significant attention in 2012 the Russian presidential election - which Vladimir Putin, currently prime minister after two presidential terms, hopes to regain the top spot in the Kremlin will be one of the most watched.
Recent street demonstrations and a poor showing for his United Russia Party at the Duma elections towards the end of last year have caused some to wonder if Putin is as popular as analysts thought. Opinion polls tell a different story. Putin holds a clear lead, with Communist Gennady Zyuganov running a distant second.
And Putin, at least in public, seems unfazed. In a speech early in, Januaryhe said the mass protests were nothing unusual, but “the unavoidable price of democracy.” His new year message to Russians was similarly sanguine, “Of course, we are in the middle of a political cycle - the parliamentary elections have finished and the presidential elections are going to start."
The protesters, many of whom are hard-line nationalists and leftists, will not give up and outside observers will be interested to see to what extent Putin will emphasize his stated desire to win back and extend Russian international influence that was lost with the collapse of the former Soviet Union. In the last few years Russian resurgance has been particularly marked over its former Soviet periphery, its former Soviet periphery, which consists of the Eastern European states of Ukraine, Belarus, and Moldova, the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, the Caucasus states of Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, and the Central Asian states of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan.
To discuss this we welcome Professor Graeme Gill, a fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia, and the author of several books on Russian politics.
Dr Gill joined the Department of Government and Public Administration of the University of Sydney in 1981, accepting a chair in 1990. He has been associate dean of the Faculty of Economics, deputy chair of the university’s academic board, acting pro vice-chancellor (research), and head of the School of Economics and Political Science. Graeme Gill has been a visiting fellow at the London School of Economics and the Moscow State University. His major research interests centre upon communist regimes and the theoretical basis underlying these regimes. His most recent research is on political change in the former Soviet and East European regions.
His publications include: The Origins of the Stalinist Political System, The Collapse of a Single Party System, Power in the Party (with R. Pitty), The Dynamics of Democratization, and Russia's Stillborn Democracy? (with R. Markwick).
Refreshments served from 6pm
Entry Fee: Members: $15.00 Senior/Student members $10.00 Guests $20.00 Please book in advance using our on line facility.
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