Look back at Weimar — and start to worry about Russia, Niall Ferguson says:
Born in 1919 in the wake of Germany’s humiliating defeat in the First World War, the Weimar Republic suffered hyperinflation, an illusory boom, a slump and then, starting in 1930, a slide into authoritarian rule, culminating in 1933 with Hitler’s appointment as chancellor. Total life: slightly less than 14 years.Born in 1991 in the wake of the Soviet Union’s humiliating defeat in the Cold War, today’s Russian Federation has suffered a slump, hyperinflation and is currently enjoying a boom on the back of high oil prices. Its slide into authoritarian rule has been gradual since Putin came to power in 1999. Is it going to culminate — 14 years on — in a full-scale dictatorship in 2005? That is beginning to look more and more likely.
Hitler’s power was consolidated after 1933 by the emasculation of both parliamentary and federal institutions. Putin has already done much to weaken the Duma. His latest scheme is to replace elected regional governors with Kremlin appointees.
Hitler’s regime also rested on the propaganda churned out by state-run media; Putin already controls Russia’s three principal television channels. And Hitler believed firmly in the primacy of the state over the economy. The Kremlin’s systematic destruction of the country’s biggest oil company, Yukos — like its effective renationalisation of the entire energy sector — suggests that Putin takes the same view and that, like Hitler, he regards both private property rights and the rule of law with contempt.