Does the west understand Russia? Perhaps the better question is: has it ever understood Russia? At the moment of the Soviet Union’s collapse, the policy consensus was that the USSR was solid as a rock. Yet while the west was praising Russia’s transition to democracy and the market, Boris Yeltsin was restoring personalised power and building institutions of oligarchic capitalism.
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Lilia Shevtsova: Russia’s dual response to the west creates policy confusion
A general view photo taken on July 31 shows the Kremlin, the History Museum and the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow.
