From the Western perspective, it is hard to attain a clear picture of the current state of Russian political and economic institutions. The opaque nature of the government and of Russia’s markets highlights a lack of transparency once hopefully envisioned under movements like Glasnost and Perestroika, regarding liberalization of Russia’s economy and democratization of its society and government. The question is, has Russia really changed that much from the Soviet era, and if so how can we take measure of the change or is it even possible to do so? We regularly notice isolated occurrences, such as oligarchs getting arrested, mergers and acquisitions within certain market segments, reporters disappearing, regional unrest, and Russia giving up its hopes of joining western institutions. We get no clear sense of whether the Russian people have a voice, of whether their welfare is a state priority, or of whether the Russian markets operate with the freedom and openness envisioned after the Soviet collapse. The only hope westerners have for gleaning any sort of reasonable depiction of modern Russia is through inferences made from specific cases. Gazprom is one such case, and it suggests that, despite claims of democratization and liberal economic order, modern Russia still resembles itself from the collapse of the Soviet Union. In late 2008 Russia and Ukraine were again embroiled in their continuous battle over natural resources; specifically, the conflict involved the new rates Russia would charge in 2009 for natural gas. With growing energy security concerns rising in Western Europe, and the Russian gas giant Gazprom gaining significant strength and leverage there, the debate raged and continues to rage over the future role of Gazprom...
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Sampath Kumar, R. (2000). president putin: good czar or bad czar? [Electronic version]. Economic and Political Weekly, 35(23), 1904-1906. Retrieved January 24, 2010, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/4409354.
Treisman, D. (2002). russia renewed? [Electronic version]. Foreign Affairs, 81(6), 58-72. Retrieved January 24, 2010, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/20033344.
Trenin, D. (2009). russia reborn. [Electronic version]. Foreign Affairs, 88(6), 64-78. Retrieved February 13, 2010, from ABI/INFORM Global. (Document ID: 1887894861).
Whitefield, Stephen (2009). russia citizens and russian democracy: perceptions of state governance and democratic practice, 1993-2007. [Electronic version] Post-Soviet Affairs, 25(2), 93-117. Retrieved February 13, 2010, from ABI/INFORM Global. (Document ID: 10.2747/1060-586X.24.2.93)
Historically, Russia has always been a country of perplexing dualities. The reality of Dual Russia, the separation of the official culture from that of the common people, persisted after the Revolution of 1917 and the Civil War. The Czarist Russia was at once modernized and backward: St. Petersburg and Moscow stood as the highly developed industrial centers of the country and two of the capitals of Europe, yet the overwhelming majority of the population were subsistent farms who lived on mir; French was the official language and the elites were highly literate, yet 82% of the populati...
Moss, W., 2014. A History of Russia Volume 2: Since 1855. 1st ed. London, England: Anthem Press London, pp.112-113.
Corney, Frederick “What Is To Be Done With Soviet Russia? The Politics Of Proscription And Possibility.” Journal Of Policy History 21.3 (2009): 264 – 281. Political Science Complete. Web. 23 Nov. 2013.
Morcombe, M. and Fielding, M. 2014. The Spirit of Change: Russia In Revolution. New South Wales: McGraw-Hill.
The United States and Russia have been battling off pernicious factions menacing the stability of their democracies over the years. Russia has come a long way over the past century, enduring a number of different phases that have completely desecrated any power Russia may have had paralleled to the rest of the world. The United States, however, has been evolving into a prosperous world power that has led to new respect from many other nations. Both Russia and the United States have struggled in the past at maintaining a significant amount of cultural commitment to preservation of specific aspects of their respective democracies. Having a relatively new democracy, Russian citizens have different perceptions and expectations of government from those of United States citizens. With new liberties and freedoms, Russians are struggling to grasp the concept of capitalism and participation in government. In order to preserve strong features of democracy, such as the right to vote or freedom of speech, a country's constituents must respect and positively view their government. They must have faith in that the government is working for their best interests. Physically, the United States and Russia have been impacted greatly by their geography. Historically, the backgrounds of Russia and the United States are of stark contrast. Traditionally, Russians have a difficult time believing in the stability of their government as it has changed a number of times. Geography has had a profound influence on the Russian psyche. Russia is a land that lies open to invasion and the elements, for it possesses no major natural barriers. In the southeast, there are great plains that allow easy entrance to any would-be conquero...
Koenker, Diane. “The Russian Revolution by Richard Pipes”. The Journal of Modern History 65, no. 2 (1993): 432.
Russia is generally apportioned the benefit of having introduced a political phenomenon that basically provided an alternative for capitalism; communism. Since this concept was only set in motion at the turn of the 20th century, we can therefore deduce that, to a large extent, Russia is, to most people, synonymous with leaders such as Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev, and Gorbachev. This supposition is entirely based on the premise that the Russian revolution of 1914 inherently altered the socio-cultural and socio-political direction of the nation, bringing into birth a never before envisioned era where Russia was not ruled by the Tsars, but by simple men; men who spoke to and articulated the needs of the masses. To this extent, communism, therefore, is largely misconceived as having been the fulcrum of Russia’s civilization. Much of this misconception , as signaled earlier, is based on the growth and progression of the Russian society in the years after the revolution until 1990, when the Berlin wall fell, essentially bringing down with it decades of Soviet Union tradition based on communism.
In a speech broadcast to London via radio on October 1st, 1939, Winston Churchill famously said: “I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma (Murdico, 1).” While it is true that Churchill was referring to his inability to predict the country’s actions in regards to the impending world war, the words can be used to illustrate a general confusion and lack of understanding, by both western and eastern powers alike, concerning the massive nation. Russia, as it stands today, currently encompasses about 6.6 million square miles of land (Murdico, 1), and is the largest country in the world by land mass. Along with a large area, Russia also has quite the large reputation; having been through two world wars, governments both communist and imperial, and a slew of civil wars and internal struggles. Russian politics and history is still today a hot topic of conversation, yet very little of this conversation mentions anything pre-WWI. It may be difficult to say exactly why this is so, as a great number of factors, including first an foremost our own cultural biases and perspectives come in to play, but it is true that Russia may confuse us because it is nearly impossible to categorize as being entirely “western” or “eastern” in nature. It is not really European nor is it truly Asian. Instead it has been shaped by a blend of different cultures and political ideologies that certainly include both European and Asian influence. Playing a huge role in this is the geography of the area; its location lends itself to contact with and, more importantly, being attacked by surrounding societies while still being pushed up against the corner of a continent in an almost isola...
Wood, A. (1986). The Russian Revolution. Seminar Studies in History. (2) Longman, p 1-98. ISBSN 0582355591, 9780582355590
Russia, a vast country with a wealth of natural resources, a well, educated population, and diverse industrial base, continues to experience, formidable difficulties in moving from its old centrally planned economy to a modern market economy. President Yeltsin's government has made substantial strides in converting to a market economy since launching its economic reform program in January 1992 by freeing nearly all prices, slashing defense spending, eliminating the old centralized distribution system, completing an ambitious voucher privatization program, establishing private financial institutions, and decentralizing trade. Russia, however, has made little progress in a number of key areas that are needed to provide a solid foundation for the transition to a market economy.
8Sites Richard, ‘The Russian Empire and the Soviet Union, 1900-1945’, in Michael Howard and William Roger Louis, The Oxford history of the twentieth century, New York, 1998, p. 117-27.
7) Vernadsky, George. A History of Russia: Fourth Edition, Completely Revised. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1954.
Riasanovsky, Nicholas V., and Mark D. Steinberg. A History of Russia. 7th ed. Oxford: Oxford, 2005. Print.
Despite making a recovery after the 1998 market crash, Russia remains weighted with numerous holdovers from the Communist era that keep its economy from taking advantage of free-market reforms. In short, Russia has not prospered under capitalism because it has not yet discovered it. In order to do so, the Russian government must engage in extensive reform in several key areas: improving the rule of law, creating stable monetary policy, and ending a policy of favoritism to particular businesses. Engaging in these reforms would lower the extremely high transaction costs of doing business legally, stimulating a wave of new investment and wealth creation within Russia, as well as encouraging investment from abroad.
3.Confesions on the Assigned topics, by Boris Yeltsin, originally published by Russian books inc. 1990, re-published by Barron's international 1993, translated by Thomas Jenkins