Last week, Russia celebrated Victory Day, the anniversary of the end of the Great Patriotic War in Europe. That war ended the Nazi regime and, while it may not have ended European fascism tout court - it dragged on in Spain, Portugal and Greece until the 1970s - it did put an end to the full-fledged racist insanity that characterized Nazi Germany and many of its allies. That war, which was fueled by the vertiginous racial views that underpinned the National Socialist world view of Adolf Hitler, claimed the lives of millions and laid waste to a continent.

Today, 57 years later, ethnic extremism has had something of a resurgence in Russia. More notably, Hitler´s name, ideology and various aspects of the Fuhrer´s life - like his birthday, April 20 - have taken on some importance for these groups. This is perplexing at first view: The Slavic peoples were hardly looked upon with respect by the Nazis and, in fact, occupied the role of Untermenschen (subhumans) in the eyes of the likes of Hitler, Goebbels and Rosenberg. While the fate the National Socialists had in mind for the Russians was not as bad as their plans for the Jews - Slavs, in the Nazi view, did not merit extermination, merely mass enslavement - it was not a pretty one. But, then again, neo-Nazis have never been known for their erudition. (As a sign of this, it is worth noting that neo-Nazi slogans scrawled on walls are invariably in ungrammatical German.)

Moreover, Russia and the other former Soviet republics suffered incredibly between 1941 and 1945: Twenty-seven million people were killed (a full quarter of the population of Belarus was slaughtered) and the Soviet Union lost over half of its industrial output. One would think that, of all people, the Russian population should understand the carnage that may be wrought by nationalist extremism.

For all its counterintuitiveness, however, such ideas still have currency in today´s Russia. (And, as should be pointed out, nationalist extremists such as Russian National Unity do not necessarily espouse Nazi ideology hook, line and sinker - they are pan-Slavists rather than Aryan supremacists.) While explicitly racist demagogues such as Viktor Anpilov, General Albert Makashov and Zavtra editor Alexander Prokhanov no longer enjoy the prominence they held during the Yeltsin era, racial violence has seen a marked increase in recent years, with mostly young men targeting non-Russians for beating and harassment, especially people of Caucasian ethnicity.

These young men, often labeled generically but inaccurately as "skinheads," belong to many different organizations or none at all, lumped together in their hatred for foreigners and generally incoherent nationalist political ideology. Indeed, it appears racial violence has increased along with the decline in ultranationalist political rhetoric. For all its rhetorical unpleasantness, the National Bolshevik Party of Eduard Limonov, Alexander Dugin and Yegor Letov never engaged in much violence beyond hurling eggs at movie directors - unless one believes the current gun-trafficking charges against Limonov, which are highly dubious.

This violence reached its apogee last year in the form of the riot at the Tsarytino market, in which 300-odd skinheads went on a rampage than killed three people. Russia was reminded of that event last month on Hitler´s birthday - skinheads had promised a repeat of the violence. (Fortunately, it seemed everybody geared up for skinhead violence except the skinheads themselves, as nothing happened on that decidedly anticlimactic day.)

In what was touted as a response to such events, President Vladimir Putin last week introduced a draft law to the State Duma to combat extremism. The law would forbid the formation of groups dedicated to perpetrating malfeasance against ethnic, religious or social groups, a offence punishable with fines and/or imprisonment.

Russia is sorely in need of such a law. Similar ones are already in effect throughout the developed world and much of the undeveloped, though there is a great deal of variation in where governments are willing to draw the line between legal and illegal groups (for example, in France, Nazi propaganda is prohibited by law, while it is legal in the United States). Any society, no matter how democratic, requires the recognition of some groups that are simply outside the pale and a legal framework within which to deal with them.

However, certain voices across the political spectrum have been raised expressing concern about the true nature and timing of the bill. Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov recently said that he believes the new law is part of an attempt to muzzle opposition voices. After all, what makes an extremist group extremist? In the absence of an independent judicial system, it is very easy for a government to simply label a group "extremist" and thereby bar them from political discourse.

However, it is hard to imagine that happening to Zyuganov´s KPRF, which is as often berated for being in bed with management as not, and is, rhetoric aside, a populist Social Democratic party at its base. It is difficult to imagine how the Kremlin could get away with banning the most popular political party in the country - though heaven knows it has certainly been tried.

The concern for mislabelled extremism has been echoed in corridors other than those of the "party of opposition." Radio Liberty (which, admittedly, has its own rather pointed ideological slant) on May 10 quoted RAND Europe analyst Stephan de Spiegeleire as expressing concern that the weakness of Russia´s judicial system would permit abuses of the law and its application against groups that should not fall under the rubric of "extremist."

It has even been alleged, occasionally, that right-wing extremism is on some level encouraged by authorities to create an atmosphere of fear and make it easier to crack down on civil liberties and/or the opposition - an accusation that is certainly believable.

These concerns are certainly warranted. Political forces everywhere, particularly in Russia, often find a way to bend legislation to their own ends. If not in the Kremlin itself, it is more than likely that there exists forces in the Russian regions - particularly those with a great deal of ethnic and/or social conflict - that would dearly love to find the means to brand their opponents "extermist," and thus wipe them off the face of the political landscape.

This is not a wise idea, as demonstrated by the example of Uzbekistan´s attempt to crack down on any and all Islamic movements, even peaceful ones - which the result that it is more threatened by Islamic extremism than ever before.

Nevertheless, something does need to be done, and the proposed bill is a good place to start. What is needed, however, is to make sure the bill does what it is supposed to do, and does not become a Trojan Horse for illegitimate authoritarianism - and this requires the vigilance of the citizen.