IT IS clear that the elections have not "consolidated democracy" in Russia or resolved any of the problems that the society is facing.
None of the major contenders represent the working class-the only force that can solve the economic and political crisis in Russia and that can end the economic and social chaos None of the major candidates offers a programme in the interests of the Russian workers, or seeks to mobilise them.
In the first ten months of 1995, nonnavment of wages increased by 136 percent, according to the Russian trade union rederation, and sparked o,uw strikes.
This tendency is continuing. A new wave of strikes began in April.
At the same time, the only instrument controlling the workers by force, the army, continues to disintegrate.
Thus, the social situation is not likely to be defused by the result.
The bureaucratic factions contending for the mantle of electoral legitimacy have carried demagogv to dizzving heights. Of course the most adept and best placed to play this game was the incumbent Boris Yeltsin.
His populist denunciations of bureaucratic abuses got him to the top of the bureaucratic heap in 1991, when it was already obvious that the old Stalinist system could not go on.
He promised then that under his management the procapitalist rerorms would not hurt the working people. But since he assumed volca power me reomes pave had a more devastating impact on the living standard of the masses of the ex-Soviet Union than even the destruction of World War Two.
"Reformed" Communist parties have been winning elections in country after country in Eastern Europe on the basis of a mass rejection of capitalist restoration. These reforms are identified chiefly with the so-called democrats-the self-procame an at sectons or the old bureaucracy.
This is despite the old-line Stalinists acceptance of the restoration of capitalism.
In the post-Soviet republic of Belarus a populist old-line Stalinist Aleksandr Lukashenko recently scored a sweeping electoral victory over the "democrats".
So Yeltsin has been running scared. He announced an end to military conscription, obvious v to appeal to the voung voters. who are less inclined than their elders to Yeltsin's electioneering will continue until the second round in early July look back to the Soviet era as a "lesser evil". Up until now, the under-25s have tended to spurn voting.
Yeltsin's sudden acceptance of a ceasefire in Chechnya, followed by a tour by the president himself, was a stroke of demagogy worthy of the historic masters of electoral manipulation.
A Polish daily reported how in the first Chechen town he visited Yeltsin "flooded" the computer room of a local school with electronic goodies.
-This year's essential summer reading will will hold your interest for a full This bureaucratic lord bountiful also promised to build a textile factory to employ women from the neighbouring villages—as a result of the procapitalist reforms, the Russian textile industry has shrunk to less than one-fifth of what it was before.
On the next leg of his journey, Severny airport outside the Chechen capital of Grozny, Yeltsin promised 90 billion rubles in children's aid. He also pledged to pay all back wages before June 15, which just happens to be the day before the elections. that the latter could not claim credit for the Russian president's security in Chechnya.
Actually the Chechen chief had already issued a personal guarantee of Yeltsin's safety as a prelude to the talks in Moscow that led to the ceasefire. Yandarbiev's safe conduct for Yeltsin was in return for the guarantee mrom te kussian president that the Chechen leader could attend the Moscow talks.
However the Chechen fighters, who have the support of the population but are heavily outgunned and outnumbered by the Russian army, can undoubtedly use a respite.
And there is no obvious reason for them not to play along with Yeltsin's electoral manoeuvre, since his main challenger, Gennadi Zyuganov of the "reformed" Communist Party of the Russian Federation, would be no better and could be worse As the campaign proceeded the contradictions in Zyuganov's bloc have become more apparent-the CPRF's economic programme was only published on May 25.
The CPRF's most prominent economist Tatvana Korvagin described their Meet 1000 young socialists from 16 European countries at this year's International Youth programme as similar to Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal to save American capitalism in the Great Depression.
CPRF has made "restoring" the Soviet state me cenual plank in tel programme It is allied with extreme and aggressive Great Russian nationalists. The old-line Stalinists indeed denounce Yeltsin for not having cracked down on the Chechens enough.
But state-managed capitalism is out of sync with the "neoliberal" offensive of the Western capitalists. The New York Times denounced the CPRF programme:
"to its many critics in Russia and the West, the plan is closer in spirit and theory to the Soviet command economy of old".
However, Nezavisimaya Gazeta, one of the main "democrat" papers, published one article on its front page distinctly friendly to the actual CPRF programme. It described it as "high quality and literate" and "for all practical purposes," devoid of "Marxist dogma"
For a considerable time now intelligent pro-capitalist economists have been saying unal some renadonalisaton and government intervention into the economy are necessary in order to smooth the path for me mansion to cabinismo.
The Russian business magazine Vek asked "Why should we wait for the Communists to renationalise?", concluding, "Privatisation has not led to a competitive private industry but rather to the decentralisation of state property".
Programmatic differences have appeared in the bloc backing Zyuganov, which includes left Stalinists, represented most prominently by Victor Anpilov of the Communist Workers Party, as well as anti-Marxist nationalists. Anpilov has criticised Zvuganov for being weak in opposing the parasitic capitalists, especially the banks.
The CPRF reply that Zyuganov's programme also has to get the support of the anti-socialist nationalists.
Besides the uninspiring record of the Communist majority in the Russian Duma, there is the experience of the slightly reconstructed, old-line Stalinist politicians in Belarus, who were swept into office in a vast wave of rejection of the reforms.
Yeltsin may have gained a few points recently when he criticised the Belarus regime for its political repression, although he is allying himself with it to bring Belarus back into a new union with Russia.
In an article on the "Post-Socialist Transformations in Eastern Europe" in the Cuban government publication, Cuba Socialista, Francisco Browne Infanta noted that the political changes in Eastern Europe retain far more support than the economic changes with which they have been associated (over 60 percent as opposed to less than 40 percent).
This indicates that the rejection of the procapitalist reforms does not mean that the majority of voters in Eastern Europe are inclined to forget the Stalinist repression. And the chauvinist programme of the CPRF and its "brown" allies involves a clearer threat of strong-arm methods than in the cases of the other "reformed" CPs that have won elections.