While the United States prospered in a world increasingly organized

along economic lines consonant with American interests and values,

post-communist Russia lurched from one near-fatal crisis to another
throughout the 1990s. This was not how things were meant to be
immediately after the break-up of the USSR and the election of the then
popular Boris Yeltsin.
According to prevailing Western line of the time;
Russia would emerge at some time in the future as a stable democratic
entity with a functioning Capitalist economy According to the prevalent
western line of the time.
They predicted that Russia with a good deal of political support from its
new found allies in the Clinton White House, and even more direct
financial assistance from the IMF, would emerge as stable democratic
entity with functioning capitalist economy.
According to them the transition from authoritarian communist and
planning would not be easy. Nor it would be without its ups and downs.
Bit at the end of the day, Russia would become what the reformers liked
to refer to as a 'normal country'
Western line prediction failed
The attempt to build a popular functioning market economy in Russia
thus far has been unsuccessful
That at least was a theory that Russia would become a stable
democratic country with its functioning capitalist economy. The actual
outcome was rather different;
Industrial production dropped
In the years following Yeltsin's election, Russian industrial production
dropped by nearly 40%.
Living standard reduced
Over 80% of Russians experienced a reduction in their living standards
Health disintegrated
life expectancy fell along with the birth rate
Morale overall collapsed
RUSSIAN CRIMINAL CAPITALISM what some critics came to refer to.
people's reaction to this Russian criminal capitalism
People who registered protested and weren't happy with this new
order
A significant number of Russians clearly didn't care for this new order
And registered their protest either by;
repeatedly expressing nostalgia for the good old days under Soviet rule,
Or by, supporting the newly formed Russian Communist Party led by
Gennadi Zyuganov.
Beneficiaries of Criminal Capitalism
People who seemed to benefit from the system were the super-rich
People who seemed to benefit from the new system were the new
super rich, the overwhelming majority of whom were simply members
of the old Soviet elite who had used their position of privilege under the
previous order to enrich themselves under the new one.
POLITICS DECLINED
The political process didn't lead to a truly democratic leader in the end
In December 1998, When Yeltsin finally resigned from office and three
months later the Russian people elected a former KGB officer, Vladimir
Putin, A man with little interests in human rights, even less in
democratic norms, and who came to power after having wages a brutal
war of ethnic destruction in the republic of Chechnya.

REASONS WHY RUSSIAN FAILED TO MAKE A TRANSITION FROM COMMUNISM

AND PLANNED ECONOMY TO CAPITALISM AND FREE MARKET ECNOMY:

Two reasons have been suggested by analysts to explain the failure of

Russia to make transition.
a) The sort of advice provided by the West itself
Russian misfortune to enter the world order at a time when market
triumphalism was in ascendant Russia according to this thesis, had the
misfortune to enter the world order in 1991 at a time when market
triumphalism was in the ascendant.
Neo liberal hubris was foisted on the country
Irresponsible policies, which had little to do with Russian conditions and
everything with what some felt was neo liberal hubris, were foisted on
the country.
These results of this irresponsible intervention were ruinous.
This version of events, inevitably, has been challenged by both the IMF
and Russian Reformers themselves. The real failure, they argue, was not
the medicine but the failure to apply it properly.
Shock therapy didn't implement
Thus, what had worked in countries like Poland and Czechoslovakia so
called Shock therapy wasn't implemented in Russia.
Russia this drifted and suffered the consequences of having abandoned
planning without then going for the market. As an IMF official is
reported to have remarked, Russia had its chance and it blew it
Post USSR Russia: The challenging situation
The situation in Russia post USSR was always going to be extremely
challenging.
No democratic but imperial past and Military industrial complex: Made
its transition hard from communist and central planned economy to
free market capitalism. No democratic tradition with over Seventy
years’ experience of communism, an imperial past, a vast military
industrial complex now with little purpose.
Improbable candidate for liberal democratic capitalism: Russia in many
ways was an improbable candidate for liberal democratic capitalism. At
a very early stage, it was evident to observers abroad that events within
the country were not unfolding as planned.
Russians voted for communist leader in 1993
In December 1993, for instance, America woke up to discover that
nearly one quarter of all Russians had voted for the extreme nationalist
Vladimir Zhirinovsky, someone who advocated the reconstruction of the
former USSR (by force if needs be) and the reacquisition of Alaska.

Russian financial system collapsed: five years later, the policy makers
then had to come to terms with a more material crisis when the Russian
financial system collapsed that wiped out the savings of many aspiring
middle-class Russians.
 Undemocratic leader elected: And less than two years on, it had to
accept the decision of the Russian people when they elected a leader
(Putin) who had only a few years earlier been warning that America had
a sinister plan to reduce Russia to the level of Third world dependency.
US Towards constructive Relationship with Russia:
Given these many problems, the West had to be prepared to take the
long view. US ready to have ties with Russia
The Untied-States especially stresses that one simply had to keep faith
with Russia, even if Russia at times did things of which the US
disapproved.
A constructive relationship is better than the rival of Cold war days: It
was reasoned that, a constructive relationship with an errant ally is
better than a return to the days of the cold war. Even Putin's election
didn't provoke much of a response.
US secretary of state, Madelaine Albright, was unambiguously clear: She insisted,
Putin would be judged by his actions in the here and now, not by his associations
and words of the past.
British PM Blair adopted exactly the same outlook. Putin, he agreed, wasn't
perfect but he had at least been elected. Moreover, he promised to bring order to
Russia and to pursue a pro-western foreign policy --reasons enough to give him a
chance.

Realism rather than Idealism thus shaped the Western response to

Russia
REASONS
To manage Russia's still huge nuclear arsenal
Russia's geographical situation at the heart of the European subcontinent
Its permanent membership of the UN Security Council where it had the power
to veto, or support, any American initiative
A more basic material consideration was, Russia may have been in crisis with
little chance of becoming an advanced market economy in the near future;
however, it still possessed important natural assets such as oil and gold.

After 10 years of trying to get to the market (with western support) it

owed the West several billion dollars.
There was always the real danger that things could get worse.
Hopefully, the consequences of this could be contained. However, in an
age of porous borders this was most unlikely. Faced with such a
daunting prospect, the west turned a blind eye to Russian actions in
Chechnya because it was happier and more prepared to do business
with Putin.
Even under conditions of globalization, there were still some very big
states facing some very real problems and if these problems seem
threatened to disturb the peace or upset world order, then the West's
attitude towards them was just as likely to be guided by a desire for
stability and democratic niceties.
If economic reform has been unable to restore Russia, because Russia is
now so weak it doesn't represent a serious problem internationally