Ironically, any effective program of political reform will require that the system revert to the framework outlined in the current constitution. Russia once again is approaching a breaking point at which reform may become inevitable. A brief flurry of liberalization and progressive reforms accompanied Dmitry Medvedev’s presidential stint but bore little fruit. The first phase of Putin’s presidency marked a full-scale retreat from political reforms yet an acceleration of certain key economic policies and the adoption of a macroeconomic framework that stressed self-reliance and the careful stockpiling of reserves from the country’s supply of energy resources and raw materials for export. Nevertheless, the central task of the Yeltsin-era reforms-the creation of a market economy-was accomplished, warts and all, even if other crucial transformations did not materialize. These efforts culminated in the economic crisis of 1998, which marked the end of liberal reforms and Russia’s political transformation along Western-oriented, democratic lines. During the early post-Soviet period of the 1990s, liberal economic reforms and the establishment of political institutions took place in parallel. Similarly, Gorbachev’s perestroika was a genuinely revolutionary reform effort, but unfortunately it followed the established pattern and fell far short of the Soviet leadership’s promises.
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