Most Russians favor a return to a Soviet-style planned economy, according to a recent poll by the independent Russian pollster Levada Center, published on its website on 17 February.
Asked whether they would prefer a planned or a free market economy, over half of those polled (52%) opted for the former. About a quarter (26%) preferred the latter, while 22% were not sure.
Support for both systems dropped slightly compared to March 2015. Then, 55% favored a planned economy, while 27% wanted to see a free market economy in Russia.Russia Insider
Respondents were also asked to choose between three political systems: the Soviet system, the current Russian system, and "Western-style democracy". Again, the Soviet model proved the most popular with 37% of respondents, while 23% opted for the current Russian model. Only 13% favored the Western system, while 8% opted for ”other". Almost one-fifth of respondents (19 %) said they didn’t know....
Most Russians Would Return to the Soviet Economic System - Poll
Simon North - Levada Center
1 comment:
My impression is that we've almost certainly been lied to on a monumental scale concerning the degree to which the Soviet system worked economically. Increasingly I doubt its collapse had much to do with its merits, economically, but was due to covert operations by the West and also opportunism within the Russian elite, oligarchs, etc.
I am not saying I endorse whatever that system was - especially the political structure (though, here too, how much of what we have been told is a lie?). I simply don't know, and doubt many of us in the West really do know.
In some respects, I think there is a parallel between the 20th century experiences of the West and the Soviet Union. In both cases, the state largely seems to have driven anything that could be said to have amounted to economic success. Then the spoils get appropriated/privatized/stolen by the oligarchs.
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