Amendments to the Russian Constitution

Recently a campaign for amendments to the Russian constitution was launched by President Putin.

On one hand I am quite OK with the current constitution.

On the other hand, amendments suggested by Putin look quite reasonable: increase of the role of Parliament in forming government, special requirements for top civil servants, additional social guarantees (for example that minimum wage can not be less than subsistence level), increase of the independence of the federal judges.

Well, the amendment stating that Constitution prevails international agreements in case of discrepancy, looks a bit more disputable. If the same rule will be implemented in civil law we can meet a lot of misunderstanding. But while we are talking about constitution only it seems more or less ok.

Good idea is that the amendments are not implemented by a limited group of politicians, instead of that President Putin decided to have them approved by a nationwide plebiscite.

Am I going to participate in the plebiscite? I do not know at the moment. Despite the fact that all that seems pretty logical, I still feel a bit of confusion. Because I do not really feel that my life is going to change somehow with the amendments or without them. In Russia for centuries we were taught a limited respect for the quality of the law, as compared to much greater importance of the quality of the person who is implementing the law.

But on the other hand, the day of plebiscite is supposed to be a day off. In the situation when President is presenting me a free day, it would be unfair not to waste half an hour of my time for voting.

By the way, we CAN vote in any way we like, nobody force us to vote for something or against something 🙂 The myth that we are under heavy pressure in voting and don’t have possibility to express our choice is far from reality.