Russia and the Problem of Democratic Transition

The failure of the August 1991 coup in the Soviet Union was both a culmination and the end of perestroika — a true revolutionary act which swept away the Soviet Communist Party as the undisputed master of the country for over seventy years. It seemed that the communist regime would never be able to reconstitute itself. But the old structures have managed to survive and reassemble themselves within the new power structure. The resulting dualism of power took on a very unusual character. The new administrators seeking to introduce market reforms have come to dominate the executive branch, while legislative power — the various Soviets within the city and the provinces, up to the Supreme Soviet and the enormous, clumsy and non-functional Congress of People's Deputies, the Russian parliament — have remained in the hands of the supporters of the old Soviet regime

Communism · Democracy · Dualism · Economic history · Legislature · Parliament · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Power (physics · Sociology · Soviet union · Eastern European Communism and Reforms · History · Law · Russia and Soviet political economy · Soviet and Russian History

• The revolutions in Eastern Europe and the redefinition of Europe

  Gerard Delanty•Contemporary Politics•1995

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