Economic and Financial Journal

When the USSR fell in 1991, Russia achieved, thanks to the reforms launched by Mikhail Gorbachev, who had come to power six years earlier, a level of democracy that it had never known in its history The Russian population then has only one wish: to see the country become a prosperous Western democracy

It is paradoxically by seeking to establish this Western democracy that the liberal Russian elites will set in motion a process which will lead to the transformation of the country into a nationalist autocracy Like others, a KGB officer named Vladimir Putin will be able to join this movement in order to make the most of it

The evolution of Russia in the 1990s shows us the essence of the process of ideological dissolution which sees a society convert to ultranationalism as the last landmark following the collapse, first of communism, then of liberalism A promising future If the situation in Russia following the fall of the USSR was very delicate with significant shortages linked to an explosion in prices, it was no less promising

Gorbachev had succeeded in establishing a real separation of powers, the foundation of all democracy The Russian population was then full of optimism

Her ability to break the August 1991 coup had invigorated her and convinced her that democracy was inevitable The link between the establishment of democratic institutions and the imminence of “Western-style” prosperity was clear to Russians

The only political shadow on the board: the strong development of a radical nationalism, which was nevertheless counterbalanced by a powerful liberal movement Thus, at the end of 1991, a poll had shown that 85% of Russians said they were in favor of a transition to a market economy

An economic and political collapse The economic collapse of Russia which took place between 1992 and 1995 resulted in a profound deindustrialisation, a fall in the standard of living and the loss of its intelligentsia The latter emigrated or converted to subsistence jobs

Ultimately, the country was reduced to the rank of a simple producer of raw materials and semi-finished products The political collapse will occur over a shorter period, during the first two post-Soviet years, then be confirmed during the presidential election of 1996

As a result of this process, Russia will have become, paradoxically, a more authoritarian country than the USSR of the late 1980s, a state where the autonomy of individuals will have considerably regressed, whether either in their relationship to their employers or to public institutions The opportunism of Vladimir Poutine, who will adopt a nationalist posture at the end of the 1990s, will only confirm the current evolutions

The beginning of a worrying transition The first months of post-Soviet Russia were a period of liberal consensus, even if the beginning of high inflation took considerable toll Assessing the situation of Russian society and the economy, the Parliament - where the former Communists, although strongly divided, were in the majority - quickly opposed the economic policies of President Boris Yeltsin

This policy, known as “shock therapy”, consisted of rapidly establishing a market economy inspired by the liberal recipes advocated by the IMF, without taking into account the complexity of the socio-economic realities of Russia It had serious social consequences since it destroyed almost all of the savings of the population

Similarly, the establishment of a free trade system could only have a devastating effect on Russian industry, which was lagging far behind its new Western competitors Paradoxically, the great organizer of these new liberal policies, Égor Gaïdar, seemed to lack a minimum of pragmatism, imposing its reforms with a dogmatism worthy of the former Soviet elites

The Establishment of an Authoritarian State In September 1993, after a year and a half of persistent conflict with Parliament, Boris Yeltsin decreed its dissolution This decree was illegal since the Constitution did not allow it

The Constitutional Court issued a judgment annulling this decree, then the Parliament voted for the dismissal of the President of Russia Invoking a coup attempt linked to violent demonstrations by supporters of Parliament, Boris Yeltsin put in place the founding act of Russian autocracy: he ordered the storming of the Parliament building by Russian armed forces

This act of incredible violence, which probably killed several hundred people, was approved by the United States, too preoccupied with eliminating what they saw as the resistance of the former Soviet elites At the time, the President of the Constitutional Court had proposed a solution: the dissolution of Parliament and at the same time the resignation of President Yeltsin, which would have made it possible to resolve this crisis while preserving the democratic framework of Russia

This option was unfortunately rejected by both parties Paradoxically, and due to its lack of homogeneity, the victory of the rather conservative Parliament would possibly have had less of an impact on Russian democracy

Thereafter, Boris Yeltsin was able, thanks to a new Constitution, to put in place the instruments of an authoritarian State by reducing, in fact, the separation of powers Parliament thus became an organ with reduced attributes, a simple chamber of consultation and recording, incapable of influencing the decisions of the executive

As for the judiciary, it lost its autonomy and its capacity to counter presidential decisions was in fact considerably reduced This is how Boris Yeltsin, re-elected in 1996 after a presidential campaign far removed from democratic standards, made Russia an authoritarian state; Vladimir Putin, who will succeed him on December 31, 1999, will be the heir

The lack of awareness on the part of the West and, above all, of the United States with regard to this enormous democratic backsliding, the consequences of which we are suffering today, can only be surprising, but at the time there was the idea that the advent of the market economy would ensure the establishment of a fully democratic logic and an authoritarian society In fact, the opposite happened

The privatizations allowed the old Russian technical and administrative elite to acquire a legal right of ownership over what they had in fact previously owned, and this contrary to the belief of certain international organizations which saw in this process a means of get rid of the maintainers inherited from the old system To state authoritarianism was added more brutally a social authoritarianism

Workers' autonomy has been greatly reduced, with business leaders now having much greater leeway in the management of their employees At the end of the 1990s, Russia became a country of oligarchs, a social class with exorbitant power compared to ordinary citizens

Rising inequality has also seen the collapse of the middle class and the intelligentsia The latter had been very present in the last years of the USSR to support the democratic transition

A West deceived by the fear of a possible return of the Soviet system? Boris Yeltsin's authoritarianism manifested itself during the first war in Chechnya, a very violent war which notably saw the almost total destruction of Grozny The many abuses committed at the time by the Russian army aroused little reaction from the European authorities; the latter, in any case, did not recognize the independence of Chechnya

With hindsight, it appears that Boris Yeltsin benefited from unjustified Western support, while he distanced Russia from any democratic logic This was confirmed during the 1996 presidential election, where he benefited from the explicit support of the United States, which, among other things, greatly helped him to win this election, when the Communist candidate appeared as the big favorite

However, the latter's victory, far from seeing the return of the USSR, would probably have tempered a resolutely anti-democratic development Faced with strong opposition from the Russian elites, he would have been forced into numerous compromises on his program

After all, other leaders claiming communism have won elections in former Eastern bloc countries, without returning to the old regime Nationalism as a substitute for a failing liberalism? It was also Boris Yeltsin's liberal team that significantly contributed to the last ingredient of today's Russia: the advent of a strong nationalism

If, at the beginning, this liberal team considered the nationalists and the communists as its worst enemies, it understood from the year 1994 that it could have points of convergence with the far-right party of Vladimir Zhirinovsky All the more so since, in the minority following the elections of the new Parliament in December 1993, liberals found that nationalists were more likely to vote for their legislative proposals than communists and centrists

By the end of the 1990s, there was no longer any doubt that in the face of the discredit of liberal ideas, nationalism was the last resort of the Russian elites Vladimir Putin understood this very quickly and made himself its apostle

By Eric Martel-Porchier, Research Professor, ICD Business School The original version of this article was published on The Conversation apostle

By Eric Martel-Porchier, Research Professor, ICD Business School The original version of this article was published on The Conversation apostle

By Eric Martel-Porchier, Research Professor, ICD Business School The original version of this article was published on The Conversation

When the USSR fell in 1991, Russia achieved, thanks to the reforms launched by Mikhail Gorbachev, who had come to power six years earlier, a level of democracy that it had never known in its history The Russian population then has only one wish: to see the country become a prosperous Western democracy It is paradoxically by seeking to establish this Western democracy that the liberal Russian elites will set in motion a process which will lead to the transformation of the country into a nationalist autocracy Like others, a KGB officer named Vladimir Putin will be able to join this movement in order to make the most of it The evolution of Russia in the 1990s shows us the essence of the process of ideological dissolution which sees a society convert to ultranationalism as the last landmark following the collapse, first of communism, then of liberalism A promising future If the situation in Russia following the fall of the USSR was very delicate with significant shortages linked to an explosion in prices, it was no less promising Gorbachev had succeeded in establishing a real separation of powers, the foundation of all democracy The Russian population was then full of optimism Her ability to break the August 1991 coup had invigorated her and convinced her that democracy was inevitable The link between the establishment of democratic institutions and the imminence of “Western-style” prosperity was clear to Russians The only political shadow on the board: the strong development of a radical nationalism, which was nevertheless counterbalanced by a powerful liberal movement Thus, at the end of 1991, a poll had shown that 85% of Russians said they were in favor of a transition to a market economy An economic and political collapse The economic collapse of Russia which took place between 1992 and 1995 resulted in a profound deindustrialisation, a fall in the standard of living and the loss of its intelligentsia The latter emigrated or converted to subsistence jobs Ultimately, the country was reduced to the rank of a simple producer of raw materials and semi-finished products The political collapse will occur over a shorter period, during the first two post-Soviet years, then be confirmed during the presidential election of 1996 As a result of this process, Russia will have become, paradoxically, a more authoritarian country than the USSR of the late 1980s, a state where the autonomy of individuals will have considerably regressed, whether either in their relationship to their employers or to public institutions The opportunism of Vladimir Poutine, who will adopt a nationalist posture at the end of the 1990s, will only confirm the current evolutions The beginning of a worrying transition The first months of post-Soviet Russia were a period of liberal consensus, even if the beginning of high inflation took considerable toll Assessing the situation of Russian society and the economy, the Parliament - where the former Communists, although strongly divided, were in the majority - quickly opposed the economic policies of President Boris Yeltsin This policy, known as “shock therapy”, consisted of rapidly establishing a market economy inspired by the liberal recipes advocated by the IMF, without taking into account the complexity of the socio-economic realities of Russia It had serious social consequences since it destroyed almost all of the savings of the population Similarly, the establishment of a free trade system could only have a devastating effect on Russian industry, which was lagging far behind its new Western competitors Paradoxically, the great organizer of these new liberal policies, Égor Gaïdar, seemed to lack a minimum of pragmatism, imposing its reforms with a dogmatism worthy of the former Soviet elites The Establishment of an Authoritarian State In September 1993, after a year and a half of persistent conflict with Parliament, Boris Yeltsin decreed its dissolution This decree was illegal since the Constitution did not allow it The Constitutional Court issued a judgment annulling this decree, then the Parliament voted for the dismissal of the President of Russia Invoking a coup attempt linked to violent demonstrations by supporters of Parliament, Boris Yeltsin put in place the founding act of Russian autocracy: he ordered the storming of the Parliament building by Russian armed forces This act of incredible violence, which probably killed several hundred people, was approved by the United States, too preoccupied with eliminating what they saw as the resistance of the former Soviet elites At the time, the President of the Constitutional Court had proposed a solution: the dissolution of Parliament and at the same time the resignation of President Yeltsin, which would have made it possible to resolve this crisis while preserving the democratic framework of Russia This option was unfortunately rejected by both parties Paradoxically, and due to its lack of homogeneity, the victory of the rather conservative Parliament would possibly have had less of an impact on Russian democracy Thereafter, Boris Yeltsin was able, thanks to a new Constitution, to put in place the instruments of an authoritarian State by reducing, in fact, the separation of powers Parliament thus became an organ with reduced attributes, a simple chamber of consultation and recording, incapable of influencing the decisions of the executive As for the judiciary, it lost its autonomy and its capacity to counter presidential decisions was in fact considerably reduced This is how Boris Yeltsin, re-elected in 1996 after a presidential campaign far removed from democratic standards, made Russia an authoritarian state; Vladimir Putin, who will succeed him on December 31, 1999, will be the heir The lack of awareness on the part of the West and, above all, of the United States with regard to this enormous democratic backsliding, the consequences of which we are suffering today, can only be surprising, but at the time there was the idea that the advent of the market economy would ensure the establishment of a fully democratic logic and an authoritarian society In fact, the opposite happened The privatizations allowed the old Russian technical and administrative elite to acquire a legal right of ownership over what they had in fact previously owned, and this contrary to the belief of certain international organizations which saw in this process a means of get rid of the maintainers inherited from the old system To state authoritarianism was added more brutally a social authoritarianism Workers' autonomy has been greatly reduced, with business leaders now having much greater leeway in the management of their employees At the end of the 1990s, Russia became a country of oligarchs, a social class with exorbitant power compared to ordinary citizens Rising inequality has also seen the collapse of the middle class and the intelligentsia The latter had been very present in the last years of the USSR to support the democratic transition A West deceived by the fear of a possible return of the Soviet system?