1
The Putin administration sought to control civil society further in 2003. While it
continued to encourage nongovernmental organizations that perform social support
functions that the state cannot provide efficiently…it systematically worked to limit
group activities that challenged state policy….
-- Freedom House, Nations in Transit 2004
1
Some human rights organizations want to show that everything is bad [with Russian law
enforcement]. We try to find a constructive niche in law enforcement organs.
-- Alexei Marchenko, Director of the Nizhniy Novgorod
Project for Justice Assistance
2
Russian civil society seemingly is under threat from an increasingly authoritarian
government.
3
Additional evidence for this view came in Vladimir Putin’s 2004 annual
address to parliament, in which he criticized some unspecified civil society organizations
for not “defending the real interests of people,” for prioritizing foreign funding, and for
“serving doubtful group and commercial interests.” Additionally, recently proposed
legislation would present further obstacles to grant-giving.
4
The role of state law
enforcement agencies – police, secret police, prosecutors – in this process is generally
conceived of as negative in two respects. First, Russian law enforcement bodies are seen
as either instigators of these repressive tendencies, or as pliant tools of national and
regional authoritarians.
5
Second, Russian law enforcement structures, even when not
1
Freedom House, Nations in Transit 2004: Russia, 2 [available at:
http://www.freedomhouse.org/research/nattransit.htm].
2
Author’s interview with Alexei Marchenko, Director of the Nizhniy Novgorod Project for Justice
Assistance, Nizhniy Novgorod, 30 April 2003.
3
See, for example, Freedom House, Nations in Transit 2004; Sarah Mendelson, “Russian Rights’
Imperiled: Has Anybody Noticed?”, International Security, 26, 4 (Spring 2002), 39-69.
4
Vladimir Putin, “Poslaniye Federal’nomu Sobraniyu Rossiyskoy Federatsii,” 26 May 2004
[http://www.president.kremlin.ru/text/appears/2004/05/64870.shtml]; Anfisa Voronina, “Fil’tr dlya
grantov,” Vedomosti, 23 July 2004; Oksana Yablokova, “New Controls Planned for Funding of NGOs,”
Moscow Times, 22 July 2004.
5
See, for example: Arkady Ostrovsky, “Is Russian democracy becoming an illusion?”, Financial
Times, 24 February 2004; Nikolai Petrov, “4 Years of Reforming the Federal System,” Moscow Times, 17
February 2004.
Convention