MOSCOW, April 3 (Itar-Tass) —— Russia’s ruling party, United Russia, needs a uniting ideology oriented towards success, and the idea of state patriotism might serve such an ideology, lawmaker Irina Yarovaya, the chairperson of the State Duma security committee, said on Tuesday.
“Both the leftist and the rightist ideologies split society and sometimes even set at loggerheads. We need to shift neither rightward nor leftward, we want Russia to move forward with its society united on the basis of patriotism of action,” she said in an article published on the website of the United Russia’s patriotic club.
The article came in response to publication of the party’s other political wings. Thus, one of the ideologists of the party’s liberal wing and head of the State Duma’s constitutional legislation committee Vladimir Pligin urged United Russia to consolidate its liberal platform. The party, in his words, should seek to win over the middle class and “not to yield to the general trend of prevailing leftist views.”
In the mean time, the Duma’s deputy speaker and member of United Russia’s supreme council, Oleg Morozov, said the party should take on a left-of-center ideology. In his opinion, Russia’s right-wing politics is sure to give birth to a strong and independent party, while “the socio-democratic wing is still vacant.” “I don’t mean to say we all must become social democrats. But I think it would be right to move leftward, to a left-of-centre ideology,” he said and suggested that the party should organize a party-wide discussion of the issue.
“Positions voiced by Vladimir Pligin and Oleg Morozov are part of discussion about the party’s future development, which I think necessary and timely,” Yarovaya said and added she was sure both Pligin and Morozov “sincerely want the party to maximally meet expectations of our voters, of Russia’s citizens.”
According to Yarovaya, the party should not be guided by only liberal or left-of-center ideas. These ideas “should be a tool” in taking decisions about the country’s development. “It is necessary to make clear what unites us, what should unite us, not only within the party. Russia needs a uniting ideology oriented towards success. United Russia can offer such an idea. This is the idea of state patriotism,” she stressed.
Meanwhile, this week United Russia may form a social-conservative platform. It is expected that a social-conservative organizing committee will be formed on Wednesday, April 4.
An ideological dispute started within the party shortly after the elections to the State Duma and has heightened in the past two weeks. United Russia plans to hold a congress at the end of spring or at the beginning of summer to outline its program guidelines.