Central Eurasia Studies

Central Eurasia Studies

Consistency and Inconsistency of Russia’s Transition to Democracy

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors
Aliakbar Jafari 1
Vahid Zolfaghari 2
1 Associate Professor of International Relations, University of Mazandaran, Iran
2 PhD Student in Comparative Politics, Munich, Germany
10.22059/jcep.2016.60538
Abstract
Experience of double revolutionary upheavals in Russia during the 20th century which produced a new socio-economic regularity on one hand and changed the political system from monarchial to democratic republic and then soviet state and finally presidential republic at the end of 20th century on the other hand are treated as democratic movements. In this regard, crumbling of ex-soviet regime and blooming of new order has been behaved as mutation toward democracy. Hence, despite of various attempts on crossing toward democracy during the last century, Russia is oscillating between democracy and authoritarianism. The main question of this paper is that why the democratization process were ill-fated in Russia? The main hypothesis of this research emphasizes on polarity between elites and masses over the concept of democracy, political culture of Russia, security background of political elites, putinism and economic structure of the state.
Keywords
authoritarianism
Democracy
political culture
Putinism
Russia

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Central Eurasia Studies
Volume 9, Issue 2
Autumn & Winter
October 2016
Pages 213-230