A tumultuous election isn't a sign that Russia will slip backward, scholar says.

WASHINGTON - The gloom over the results of the Russian election may be more media hype than reality, according to one U.S. expert just back from Moscow.

Leon Aron, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, says most Russians remain committed to political and economic reforms. While not unified over the "shock therapy" approach offered by the most liberal reformers, Russians are not headed back to the dark days of a military state that crushes human lives like icicles on the cobblestones of Red Square, Aron says.

Let's hope that he is right. A hostile Russia that rearms and throws out democratic reforms would destabilize global politics and force President Clinton to reconsider his plans to scale back U.S. military forces. The budget would again be in play, agitating the bond market.

Aron gave his views to reporters last week after spending a week watching the elections from the campaign headquarters of Russia's Choice, the mainline reform party headed by deputy prime minister Yegor Gaidar. Aron, who was born in Moscow, holds a Ph.D. in political sociology from Columbia University and is writing a biography of Russian President Boris Yeltsin.

Official government statistics portray a Russian economy that is still in chaos, afflicted by falling production, rising unemployment, and red-hot inflation. Anecdotal accounts portray widespread crime with thugs controlling the flow of goods and services to ordinary citizens.

According to the International Monetary Fund, output in Russia shrank by an estimated 45% in the last three years.

But Aron says the official statistics do not tell the real story because they reflect the massive downsizing of the military and a turning away from production of unwanted goods.

In fact, he says, there are some hopeful signs. Dire predictions of a breakdown in industrial production and mass starvation have not materialized. The long lines of shoppers waiting to buy goods have disappeared, "and more people have access to quality goods and food," Aron says, although prices remain beyond the reach of many citizens.

Russians have also ended the humiliation of the hard currency stores, which only took dollars for luxury goods, and now have a currency that can be readily exchanged. And the country is gradually stepping up production of grain and other foods, and increasing the supply of services and light goods.

Aron says the pro-government party Russia's Choice is filled "with the best and the brightest" of the country's political activists, who conducted a campaign with wit and humor. The party's election slogan was "Liberty, Property, Law," an appeal for standards familiar to Americans.

Aron says that while Gaidar's party won only a fraction of the votes, it captured more seats than other rivals in the Duma, Russia's lower house. Moreover, pollsters told him that Gaidar would have garnered more votes if Yeltsin had not withheld his endorsement, a move that surprised many but enabled Yeltsin to act like a national leader above the fray of partisan differences.

Vladimir Zhirinovsky, leader of the ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party, has emerged as the Darth Vader of Russian politics, an evil spoiler. Zhirinovsky drew his support from defense workers, members of the armed forces, and workers in state-run enterprises - the victims of Russia's demilitarization.

But Zhirinovsky is vehemently anticommunist, Aron says, and it is unlikely the ultranationalists can form an effective alliance with the revived Communist Party against Gaidar. More likely, he suggests, the parliament will remain fractious, with shifting alliances.

That may make it tough for Yeltsin, but Yeltsin thrives in rough-and-tumble politics. Moreover, the president strengthened his hand by winning voter approval of a new constitution that gives greater power to his office.

None of this is to say that the road for Russia will be easy. But Aron does not believe the country will again be an armed camp that takes a confrontational stance against the United States.

For reprint and licensing requests for this article, click here.
MORE FROM AMERICAN BANKER