The name of the Russian Federation's third president can be entered in history books now: Dmitriy Medvedev. The foundation of his success consists of two main components. First, it is the electorate's high assessment of Vladimir Putin's eight years in office: The economy developed, people recovered their dignity, and Russia got back on its feet. Second, voters pin great hopes on Medvedev and count on his dynamic and effective leadership. The new president epitomizes both continuity and changes. Russia is facing very serious modernization challenges, and only a disciplined and committed authority enjoying the people's full confidence can meet them. Hence, the great importance of the issue of legitimacy of power and its recognition by the electorate.
Therefore, it is very important that Medvedev came to power with a huge reserve of legitimacy having received a lot more votes than his predecessors in their first elections. Despite all the successes of the past years we have a countless number of problems. Their solution requires mutual understanding, a contract between the authorities and society. Medvedev defined his priorities as "the four i's" -- institutions, innovation, investment and infrastructure. It is true that without implementing them the country will be doomed to being second-rate as a minimum.
Institutions comprise the state and its administrative organs and form the democratic political environment. Jokes apart, the country did not manage to even come close to the implementation of its major economic projects over the past 15 years: First, there was no money. Then, there was no spending mechanism, especially the one to ensure that funds are not embezzled during the process. The national projects of which First Deputy Prime Minister Medvedev was in charge should also be regarded as a method of developing mechanisms for implementing breakthrough programs in all other fields. A normal institutional environment presumes a clean judicial authority, which is yet to be created. If we fail to create it we will never cope with embezzlement, corruption, raidership, and state and gangster racketeering.
World experience attests that stability of institutions established in line with the constitution and their existence for decades in an unchanged form are the main conditions for strengthening democratic traditions, which are still new in Russia. Innovation should help to overcome Russia's scientific and ideological lag behind developed countries. There are up to 100 breakthrough scientific directions determining the world's future. In experts' opinion, Russia does not have the status of leader in any of these directions yet. There are some directions the essence of which we do not even always understand.
An economy relying on natural resources is not a bad diagnosis at all. Moreover, the existence of resources prices for which are constantly growing allows us to carry out large-scale redistribution of funds to invest them in science-intensive sectors, in an economy of knowledge. It is extremely important to reverse the "brain drain," keeping in mind that Western states owe their scientific leadership to our specialists to a considerable degree. Russian can be heard on every corner in the world's main brain tank -- the Silicone Valley in California....
Investments -- both domestic and foreign -- have finally started to flow in. However, due to a weakness of institutions, the problem of targeted use of even those funds that are available persists. Besides, the volume of these funds should increase several-fold for Russia to enter the group of world leaders. The infrastructure requires greatest investment. The huge country does not yet have a single superhighway (if we do not take into account the Moscow beltway, which can be called so rather symbolically!) Russia has only one modern airport (Domodedovo) and a limited number of runways that can receive contemporary jumbo jets. The United States and Germany built their highway networks back in the 1930s. You should see superhighways and airports in contemporary China's provinces!
However, the first four "i's" do not exhaust the authorities' priority tasks -- far from it. There are many more of them. Due to the size of this article, I would only add three additional "i's." Inflation occupies the top position on the list of problems evoking people's concern. Growing prices are the most serious direct challenge to the current and future authorities. There are many external reasons for inflation: Prices are growing everywhere and for all products ranging from energy to food. However, a lot can and should be done inside the country. The freezing of prices is in the best case a palliative, but rather the road to nowhere. The only way to combat inflation is by increasing productivity and production volumes, as well as strengthening competition, which requires incentives for small and medium-sized businesses.
At one point people started to regard ideology as an attribute of the past in our pragmatic world. However, it is not so. The economic potential and military-political might of states do not play the decisive role at all. More and more often, and very justly so, people talk about the growing importance of "gentle force," the ability to influence the rest of the world by means of ideas, targeted information flows, and cultural attraction. Russia should propose spectacular ideas to the rest of the planet, which is asking more and more questions on how to live further, especially in the face of an economic slowdown approaching the West. Pragmatism can be opposed by idealism based on the principles Medvedev cited in his speeches: Freedom, justice, and human dignity. The jungle law, the war of everybody against everybody should be opposed by supremacy of international law.
The country's image is a component of gentle force also. I recently happened to make a lot of comments about the election campaign for Western TV channels. Very mildly speaking, they do not share our people's optimism over the election results and the country's general policy. Some of their opinions are objective, taking into account that nobody needs Russia as a strong rival. However, our work in this field is obviously insufficient. Russia is much better than it is presented in the foreign media or in politicians' speeches.
One of the main ways to change stereotypes is through better explanation of the country's policy at all levels. Speechless ministries and their leaders and speechless press services of the supreme state organs are not the best instrument for improving the country's image. Russia of Dmitriy Medvedev's epoch faces a different quality of problems. We are not struggling for survival; we are fighting for leadership. This concerns all of us.
