It may seem Putin controls the Russian state personally. The reality is more dangerous

Alexei Navalny, a well-known critic of the Kremlin, is currently receiving treatment in Germany after becoming severely ill on a flight to Moscow from the Siberian city of Tomsk. Staff members travelling with him claim he was poisoned, possibly as a result of drinking tea at the airport lounge before takeoff. Although Navalny is not Russia’s only pro-democracy activist, he is a uniquely important oppositional force. His suspected poisoning, which simultaneously stunned observers and fulfilled long-held fears, sheds light on a system too often portrayed as a centralised monolith under Vladimir Putin’s personal control. The reality is more complicated – and much more dangerous.

Navalny is equal parts activist, investigative journalist and politician. His Anti-Corruption Foundation has produced dozens of reports detailing the extensive property holdings of Russia’s political elite, which have been viewed millions of times on YouTube and drawn tens of thousands of people to the streets across the country in protest. He has also overseen a number of projects that help to empower ordinary Russians vis-a-vis the political system. The most recent is the “smart voting” system, which strategically coordinates the votes of opposition-minded individuals in specific electoral districts in order to defeat regime-backed candidates. Early assessments of the platform suggest it worked well in the 2019 regional elections. In addition to these projects, Navalny has run western-style electoral campaigns relying on crowdfunding and armies of enthusiastic volunteers. In 2013, he came in second in Moscow’s first mayoral election in a decade. In 2018, he was barred from the presidential election for dubious reasons, despite having opened fully staffed campaign offices in every one of Russia’s regions.

Navalny’s long and very public career as a Kremlin critic has led some to wonder: how can he do what he does and still be alive? He was apparently asked about this very issue by activists in Siberia before he fell ill.

There are legitimate reasons to fear for his safety. Navalny suffered poisoning-like symptoms last summer and was doused in the face with chemical dye in 2017, which caused permanent damage to one of his eyes. The activist Vladimir Kara-Murza, who has lobbied for sanctions on Russia, survived apparent poisonings in 2015 and 2017. The well-known investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya survived a poisoning in 2004 (also becoming ill on a domestic flight) before being shot dead in her apartment building two years later. Other examples abound.

Popular narratives about Russia are infused with the idea that Putin sits atop a highly centralised system that he controls manually. While Putin is certainly Russia’s most important decision-maker, the political system is not his personal well-oiled machine. Instead, the system has a set of operating principles – chief among them a lack of the rule of law – and perverse accountability, which sometimes produce outcomes that are less than optimal for the Kremlin.

We often see evidence of this during elections when some regions in Russia report official results that strain credulity as local poll workers strive to please superiors with a good showing for pro-regime candidates. The problem, of course, is that while these results get the job done, they cast doubt on the legitimacy of the election and provide ammunition for critics.

We also sometimes see actors on the periphery of the system try to act independently on behalf of the Kremlin. Boris Nemtsov, a deputy prime minister under Boris Yeltsin and long-time Putin critic, was assassinated outside the Kremlin’s walls in early 2015. His murder, which deeply shocked many in Russia, was eventually attributed to a group of hired killers. However, his family and others are convinced that it was ordered by Ramzan Kadyrov, the head of the Chechen Republic who has a close relationship with Putin.

Journalists and critics can also be caught up in disputes that have little to do with the Kremlin but illustrate how the corrupt machinery of the state can be used against almost anyone. Last summer, Ivan Golunov, a journalist in Moscow, was arrested for drug possession. Trumped-up charges with questionable evidence are not uncommon in Russia where the acquittal rate in criminal cases is just 0.25%. Golunov’s case, which sparked large protests and was eventually dismissed, was probably the result of a dispute between local actors, but it brought unwelcome critical attention to the system at a time when authorities were trying to conduct a tough electoral campaign in Moscow.

These examples and many others complicate widely held ideas about how Russia is governed, and they also suggest that the country is more dangerous for opponents than we may assume.

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The same day that he was flown to Germany, an article appeared in a Russian newspaper detailing how closely Navalny was being surveilled on his trip to Siberia. The source for the article seems to be the security services and it describes how difficult it would have been to poison the activist: Navalny does not use his own credit cards, his staff reserve different hotel rooms, and he does not publicise his agenda. Read alongside unfounded rumours about Navalny’s alcoholism, drug use and blood sugar imbalances that began to circulate from regime-aligned sources late last week, the surveillance report suggests the Kremlin is working hard to signal that it had nothing to do with his illness.

Although Navalny is a thorn in the side of the Kremlin, his death would certainly galvanise the opposition. This is probably the last thing that the regime would want at a time when Russia’s closest neighbour, Belarus, is engulfed in anti-regime protests and the far eastern region of Khabarovsk is also in its second month of mass protest. And yet, despite what the Kremlin would presumably want, Navalny is gravely ill.

• Yana Gorokhovskaia is a political scientist researching civil society in Russia