GIANNI   SALVINI

Dal «sistema Russia» a Putin

N. 201

 

Summary — The article attempts to underline certain aspects of the continuity and discontinuity of Vladimir Putin's regime in Russia's political development.

The first part analyzes some features of the "Russian system" reproduced for centuries until 1991 and based on total control of society by the ruling establishment.

In this respect Russian history is considered in Europe but not of Europe.

The article then evaluates the Soviet institutional legacy and revolutionary discontinuity of the Eltsin decade (1991-1999), considered an "elective autocracy".

Putin has reformed Eltsin's regime by creating what could be described as a «bureaucratic-authoritarian regime». Putin is likely to act within the limits of a hybrid scenario, remaining a reformer in the field of economy and foreign policy and conservative in regard to power.

The conclusion is that Putin's Russia will be able to discard the remnants of the «Russian system» only when it has exhausted its stabilization and modernization potential.