Alexei Navalny’s speech at the Democratic Choice party conference
The speaker argues that the authorities have definitively abandoned any positive change, have openly cemented their desire to remain in power for life, and have thereby created a political clarity that leaves no room for illusions about the possibility of reform from above. In these circumstances, he believes, the opposition in the coming years should focus on honest campaigning without manipulation and on the systematic dissemination of information about corruption and abuses, since this is precisely what can undermine the current regime’s genuine popularity. At the same time, he calls for abandoning ineffective attempts to build traditional party structures and moving toward new forms of organization based on electronic democracy, direct voting, and the transparent election of leaders. In conclusion, he emphasizes that the opposition will be able to achieve a change of power only if it acts more honestly, more openly, and more democratically than its opponents.
Text version
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An event that we are holding for the second time already
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Usually, opposition
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gatherings are all held in order to
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nominate someone at the end, support
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some resolution, merge into a single
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ecstasy over something, and, uh, events where
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there is simply a substantive and
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good-natured discussion of important issues.
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They are very rare; they practically never
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happen. This is the second time I’ve taken part with great
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pleasure. Thank you very much,
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Vladimir. Please, just
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don’t quarrel with anyone.
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Ah, about the authorities.
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More than a year ago, speaking at a similar
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conference, I began by saying that
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there was no window of opportunity
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at all. Yes, now I would like with
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satisfaction to reaffirm this
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thesis. There is no window of opportunity.
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And to this we can add one more
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generally positive point.
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There is no need for us to rush.
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So, uh, it has all happened. The authorities
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have definitively confirmed that, on the one
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hand, they have exhausted their capacity
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for any positive change, that
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there really was some reform-minded faction among them,
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but that faction has suffered
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defeat, unfortunately, to the great
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and the authorities, and specific people within them,
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have announced that in effect they
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have openly said: yes, we will usurp
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this power, yes, this power will
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belong to us for life. And that
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remarkable political
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clarity is a big plus for
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us, for everyone. And I believe that it is
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always better when the guy who
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holds real power is also its
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formal holder. And finally, now
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there is no longer that duality which
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allowed many of us, some of us,
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us
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to take up certain
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rather vague political
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positions and created a certain confusion in our
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ranks.
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More importantly,
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everything is clear with our authorities; the more
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important issue, it seems to me,
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is what the opposition should
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do. The opposition.
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It seems to me the time has come when the old
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worn-out, but only correct
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slogan
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“honesty is the best policy” can absolutely
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be applied to the opposition both as
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an ideological foundation and as
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an organizational one.
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Right now, we can conduct any campaigning
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only on the basis of
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honest and sound arguments. In order
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to persuade the public of something, in order
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to run a campaign,
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there is no need to lie,
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or manipulate facts, or do anything
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of the sort.
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It is enough to explain fairly and soberly
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what is happening. There is absolutely no need
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to distort anything in order
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to get the public to follow us. I
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believe that in the near future, over
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the next two years, the opposition should
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focus on conducting
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campaigns and on
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building a new kind of organizational
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structure. When I speak about campaigning,
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it is most often perceived
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in a negative context, because
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people immediately drift into allusions from
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the old “going to the people” tradition (a 19th-century Russian populist idea). Some
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bespectacled university types going to the peasants
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in the village, and the peasants beat them up and hand them over to the
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gendarmerie (the tsarist political police). But all these
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historical parallels are no longer
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relevant at all.
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And running campaigns now
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really does
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strike the authorities seriously and effectively. And
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we can see that probably one of the
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campaigns with which I am partly
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involved, “the party of crooks and thieves,”
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is spreading quite effectively
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on its own. Why? Because it is
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true. And I am absolutely convinced, and I will once again
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repeat the point I made at the
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previous conference: that Putin’s regime
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is based on his real popularity.
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That is, Putin does have real
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support. But whereas before 2003 this
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support was growing and was solid,
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because the authorities had undoubtedly
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achieved certain successes in governing
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the country, after 2007 that support
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has rested more on
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media propaganda. And our task is to make
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sure that every person in the country knows
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about Gun. Our task is to make sure that
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every person in the country knows about
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Rotenberg. Our task is that in this country
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everyone should know about the Kovalchuks, about Ramzan
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Kadyrov, and about all these strange
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things that are happening. And all the
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technological means for this
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already exist. Running this kind of campaigning costs us
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0 rubles and 0 kopecks right now. And we can reach
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millions of people. What we need is not—but rather we need to
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finally stop talking about how
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There is no such thing as online and offline. There is
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some supposedly real, actual life, and then there is
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virtual life on the internet. That is all
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complete nonsense. Right now we can
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reach, through the internet, once again,
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spending 0 rubles and 0 kopecks, millions
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of people, and they in turn will then
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carry it into the so-called offline world, that is,
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to people who have absolutely no
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access. Time is on our side.
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Internet penetration is growing. Therefore,
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let me repeat, campaigning efforts
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based on honesty, without any
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distortion, without propaganda,
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will bring us
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serious, serious benefits and serious
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serious impact in that they will
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strike at the foundation of Putin’s regime, its
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real popularity. And with
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serious effort in this
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direction, Putin’s approval rating will fall in
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the coming years, I think, to below 15%,
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which, broadly speaking, will seriously change
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the political situation in the country. Second,
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organizational development.
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And I believe that the opposition—I think that
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Vladimir Milov will not actually agree
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with me here, nor will some
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of his other colleagues. I believe that
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organizational development should
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proceed in fundamentally new forms, and
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again be based on the principle that
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honesty is the best policy. Let us
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say frankly to ourselves: first of all, all
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attempts to register
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formal opposition parties have not
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succeeded, because the opposition itself does not
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believe that it has a real
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60,000 people. Yes,
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the opposition does not believe it, the authorities do not
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believe it, and they know that the opposition does not
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believe it, and so on. In other words, everyone
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understands everything. And therefore, when someone
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is not registered, well, they are not registered, and
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no thousands come out into the streets.
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We need to move away from this paradigm
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of following the Justice Ministry’s instructions and
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registering formats, forms—let us call them
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proto-parties of some kind, right? And their main
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goal should be to have
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those proverbial 60,000 or
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100,000 people, or however many
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real thousands of people. And here I
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will once again speak as an advocate
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of electronic democracy systems. I think
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that Leonid Volkov will speak about this today.
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I believe that these systems
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are beneficial and effective because,
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first, they cost nothing, they are
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organizationally accessible to us, people in them
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are verified, and we will know for certain
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that these people really exist.
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Organizational development will, as I have already
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said, involve very low costs. And what is
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important is that we will finally be able
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to switch
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to new systems and formats for electing
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leaders. What had been happening up
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to this point? Simply by virtue
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of the fact that there were technological barriers,
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the only way to struggle for
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leadership was, for the most part, intrigue.
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That is, there are parties, there are party
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congresses, there are delegates, and your internal party
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struggle basically comes down to
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scheming in order to win over
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let us say, 150 delegates
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out of 200. Now this is no longer necessary. There is no
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need to waste time on it. And these
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so-called opposition leaders should
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be elected by thousands or
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tens of thousands of people. Right now we have no
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barrier that would explain why we
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make all decisions
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through congresses and conferences.
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Now all the most important decisions can be
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made by direct voting of all the people
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participating in a given organization.
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That is, thousands of people can
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take part in this. And this can now be carried out
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in such a way that no one has
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any doubts that there is some kind of
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falsification or anything else here. Absolutely
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honest voting, and people are elected by
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thousands of grassroots activists. This,
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and this is no small thing, will also give
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the opposition leaders the necessary legitimacy.
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leaders.
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2 minutes.
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2 minutes. Thank you very much. Right now our
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opposition leaders’ legitimacy
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is based mainly on the fact that they
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held some good positions,
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high-ranking or lower-ranking, though most often high-ranking
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posts in the executive branch, which,
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naturally, is excellent and
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constitutes
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a good background, but it should not
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be the sole basis for occupying
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those leadership positions in the opposition.
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What matters is the real support of thousands of people. That is what
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will give us, well, that very table
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of ranks—who is stronger and who is not. And,
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finally,
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we will move away from all this intrigue,
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from all this squabbling. It is clear that
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if you came in second place and you came in
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third place, then that is the order in which you stand.
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and sit on the presidium. And everyone is
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fine with that. And then the following year you can
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throw down a challenge to the guy
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who came second, and end up not
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third, but second or even first. That’s
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perfectly normal. And that is exactly what we
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need. So, uh, in closing my
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remarks,
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organizational development must be based on
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systems of electronic democracy and
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systems of,
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let’s say, primaries and direct
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voting by large numbers of people.
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Let’s also, uh, admit to ourselves
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that maybe the primaries that were
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held by United Russia (the ruling political party), they were
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absolutely awful, and maybe there was
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50 percent fraud there, but in any case it was 10
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times more honest than all the primaries
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that the opposition had held up to that
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point. That is an absolutely undeniable fact. And
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until we ourselves—until our own
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organizational development within
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the opposition becomes an order of magnitude more honest,
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more transparent than the authorities, we will
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have no way of defeating them.
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Honesty is the best policy. We must
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show everyone a moral, if you like,
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an ethical example. In order to
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defeat them, we have to be better than they are.
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I believe we are ready to move toward that. We
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are ready to choose the best from among ourselves. And we
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are ready ourselves to act and live by
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the principles of democracy, the principles of
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openness and transparency. There can be no
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despondency. Frankly,
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I don’t know where all this talk comes from
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about everyone supposedly getting ready
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to leave. Nothing has happened. We lived until
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September 24, then they showed us something
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on television, and we clutched our heads.
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Oh, what a horror, we’re all leaving somewhere.
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No one is going anywhere. I repeat, this
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government will change. It will not change through
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elections, but it most certainly
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will change.
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If we devote substantial
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effort to this—honest effort, conscientious
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effort—we will replace it within the next 3 years.
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Thank you,
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Alexei.
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[applause]
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Yeah.