herodotus
Well-known member
When, where, how, and why did democracy die in Russia? Was it Putin that killed democracy or did it come during the Yeltsin era? What caused democracy to die in Russia? When did it die? Who is responsible for it dying? I remember being a little boy on Christmas in 1991 and seeing the hammer and sickle falling and the tri color rising in its place. I remember the optimism and hope of the late 80s and early 90s. Admittedly at the time I was too young to appreciate it but I saw it. The fear of nuclear war was over, the archives were opening up. People were voting. There were dumas, multi party elections, political parties, political prisoners were free, Dzerzhinsky's statue was being pulled down in front of the Lubyanka. West and East everyone was breathing a sigh of relief. So what the hell happened? How did we get from this optimistic time in the early 90s where it looked like Russians were finally embracing liberal democracy to this time now where the threat of nuclear war is the worst its been since the Cold War? I ask this because I am curious how we got to this point from what seemed to be so promising at least until Yeltsin shelled parliament (that cannot be an act of democracy, its one hell of a checks and balances but its not democracy) and also also because while I don't see this war ending until after Putin, I do believe that eventually he will leave office. He may either retire, he may pass away in office, he may be voted out by his people, or he may be forced out via demonstration, but some time in the next 10 to 20 years he will be gone and then it will be time to repair relations with them and I do want them to have a democracy and a peaceful government and so when we try to help them build a democracy I want to make damn sure the mistakes that led from democracy to Putinism don't happen again. Thanks for your time and input. There are some wrong answers, but on the whole they are few in number so lets discuss this.