The Economist - USA (2020-02-08)

The EconomistFebruary 8th 2020 Europe 43

E

nter an eleganttwo-storeyArt

Nouveau house in Tomsk, a Siberian

university town, walk up a solid wooden

staircase and step into the measured

world of an early 20th-century university

professor.

The visitor to this private museum is

invited to look through old family al-

bums, sit at the professor’s desk and sniff

a perfume made for the 300th anniversa-

ry of the imperial Romanov dynasty in

1913 (rebranded “Red Moscow” after the

revolution). You can put on the profes-

sor’s pince-nezand leaf through his 1909

wall calendar. A cup of tea from a period

chinasetandanauthenticallywarming

schnappspouredbya considerateguide

attheendofthetourcompletesyour

immersionina worldthathasnotbeen

touchedbytheBolshevikrevolution,the

secondworldwarortheSovietUnion’s

collapse.Youhalfexpecttheprofessorto

shufflebackin.

Thereisonlyonecatch.Therewasno

professor.Bothheandhisapartment

werecreatedabouta yearagobya busi-

nessmanfromNovosibirskwhohad

boughttheflatinanoldwoodenhouse

forhisson,a studentatTomskuniversi-

ty,andfurnishedit withobjectshehad

collectedover 20 years.

Incountrieswhereoldhomesand

objectsoftenstayinthesamefamily,

sucha projectmightcomeacrossasfalse

orredundant.InRussia,wherefamily

historieswerecuttoshredsbythe20th

century’sman-madedisasters,holding

ontothepastisa fixation. “We try to

preserve a past that can disappear at any

moment,” says Katerina Kirsanova, the

museum’s curator.

Tomsk, bypassed by the trans-Siberi-

an railway and spared the architectural

excesses of 20th-century modernisation,

suffered in the early years of the 21st

century when unscrupulous business-

men set many of its protected buildings

ablaze (sometimes with residents inside)

to grab land in the historic centre. The

professor’s building was also damaged in

a fire in which a student died. Its con-

version into a museum is not so much a

tributetothecontinuumofhistory,asa

testamenttoitsconstantdisruptions.

Thevagariesofmemory

Russia

TOMSK

A museum for a man who never existed

Looksrealenough

N

ot sincethe days of Eamon de Valera

has Ireland had a leader as globally rec-

ognisable as Leo Varadkar. Both men owe

their prominence to vexed Irish relations

with Britain. De Valera emerged as the se-

nior surviving leader of the Easter uprising

against British rule in 1916. Mr Varadkar ral-

lied eusupport in a stand-off with Boris

Johnson over the terms of Brexit last year.

Yet whereas de Valera spent half a cen-

tury in and out of high office, building

modern Ireland in the process, Mr Varad-

kar faces the sack. Polls suggest that his

centre-right Fine Gael party will slump to

third place in an election on February 8th,

falling behind not only its traditional rival,

Fianna Fail, another party of the centre-

right, but also Sinn Fein, the shock leader.

If so, it would be the first time since the

1930s that Fianna Fail and Fine Gael have

not been the top two.

Mr Varadkar’s career may have peaked at

the tender age of 41, less than three years

after he became not only Ireland’s youn-

gest ever taoiseach (prime minister) but

also its first openly gay one, and the first to

have non-European heritage (his father, a

doctor, is originally from Mumbai).

Fine Gael had based its re-election cam-

paign on Mr Varadkar’s success in negotiat-

ing a deal with Britain over Brexit and on

gdpgrowth of almost 5% last year, com-

pared with 1.8% for the rest of the eu. But,

says Professor Jane Suiter of Dublin City

University, a series of unfortunate events

have interfered with Mr Varadkar’s plans.

Voters fret about a health service near col-

lapse, and a cost-of-living and housing cri-

sis. Ireland has some of the highest rents in

the world, and soaring homelessness.

Theresa Reidy of University College

Cork says that conservative voters who

want to punish the government can look to

Fianna Fail’s Micheal Martin as another

leader who would probably do a similar job

to Mr Varadkar. Since 2016 Fianna Fail has

supported Fine Gael’s minority govern-

ment in a confidence-and-supply arrange-

ment that it is now tired of.

Angry younger voters are turning to a

range of green and centre-left parties, but

most of all to Sinn Fein. Formerly the polit-

ical wing of the Provisional Irish Republi-

can Army (ira), the party is led by Mary Lou

McDonald, a personable Dubliner with no

history of involvement in the ira.The oth-

er two big parties have both pledged to

shun Sinn Fein for its past support for vio-

lence, but making a government without it

will be hard, since Fianna Fail has vowed

not to continue its arrangement with Fine

Gael. Most of Sinn Fein’s policies are well to

the left. It promises a rent freeze, earlier re-

tirement and lavish public spending on

nearly everything. It is also committed to a

referendum on uniting Ireland.

“Sinn Fein have never been in govern-

ment in Dublin before, so they are not held

responsible for the present problems in the

way that Fianna Fail and Fine Gael are,”

says Ms Reidy. “They are responsible for

some other things, for sure, which is why

older people, who remember the Troubles,

aren’t flocking to them in the same num-

bers. But young people don’t remember

that. And [they] are the ones who can’t af-

ford to buy or rent homes, and who are be-

ing quoted €3,000 for car insurance.” 7

DUBLIN

A party that once espoused violence is

leading the polls

Ireland

The worrying rise

of Sinn Fein

Turkey did not recognise Russia’s annex-

ation of Crimea, which he correctly called

illegitimate. He also greeted Ukrainian

troops with a nationalist slogan that irks

the Kremlin.

Yet there is a limit to how far Turkey’s

leader can go. Confrontation with the Syri-

an regime in Idlib is manageable. Confron-

tation with Russia is dangerous. After Tur-

key shot down a Russian warplane in late

2015, Moscow imposed heavy sanctions

and cut Turkey off from its proxies in Syria.

It was only after Mr Erdogan apologised

and made a series of concessions to Russia

that the rapprochement between the two

countries began. Turkey will try to stop the

offensive in Idlib. But it will probably not

risk conflict with Russia. And indeed, Rus-

sia does not want a war with Turkey, a nato

member. Meanwhile, Syria may have to

brace for more bloodletting, and Reyhanli

for more refugees. 7