1984 Opinion polls investigate attitudes to Gorbachev and perestroika Author: Vldimir Dzaguto [Contemporary Russia doesn't value Mikhail Gorbachev and the perestroika he initiated. Judging by opinion polls, attempts to teach Russian citizens about democratic liberties and the values of Western civilization have repelled most of them.]
Contemporary Russia doesn't value Mikhail Gorbachev and the perestroika he initiated. Judging by opinion polls, attempts to teach Russian citizens about democratic liberties and the values of Western civilization have repelled most of them. The latest poll done by the National Public Opinion Research Center (VTsIOM) shows that most respondents (61%) take a negative view of perestroika. Similar findings are reported by the Complex Social Studies Institute (CSSI) at the Russian Academy of Sciences: 63% of respondents dislike perestroika. Gorbachev himself may
find some comfort in the thought that the people think more kindly of him than of his achievements. Only 45% of respondents in the VTsIOM poll and 49% in the CSSI poll say they dislike Gorbachev personally.
Those who approve of Gorbachev and his reforms are few, vastly outnumbered by supporters of President Putin. VTsIOM reports that 13% of respondents approve of Gorbachev (36% in the CSSI poll). In the VTsIOM poll, 12% of respondents approve of Gorbachev's perestroika; in the CSSI poll, 28% approve.
Those who don't care about Gorbachev one way or the other are numerous. According to VTsIOM, 34% of respondents don't care about Gorbachev (7% of respondents were uncertain). And 25% of respondents were uncertain when asked about perestroika.
This split in public opinion (few people liked the dramatic changes in the political and economic systems during the late 1980s) has been in place for over 15 years already. The CSSI cites the following figures: when perestroika was launched, 54% of respondents supported it and 30% did not. Everything changed by the end of the 1980s and the start of the 1990s, when two-thirds of respondents were against perestroika and only a quarter were for it.
Fifteen years later, the situation has remained practically unchanged: few Russian citizens approve of perestroika and its consequences. VTsIOM asked respondents what they consider the worst problems of the post-Soviet period: 57% mentioned instability, 56% said moral degeneration, 50% said insecurity, 44% said
lack of law and order, and 33% said ethnic conflicts.
The CSSI reports that 36% of respondents say they would go back to "before 1985" if given half a chance, and only 27% prefer the present. And 28% of respondents said they dislike life
then and now equally.
Translated by A. Ignatkin
20 years on, most Russians regret Gorbachev reforms
MOSCOW, March 11 (Reuters) - Most Russians regret the reforms started by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, who came to power 20 years ago and is credited in the West
with helping end the Cold War, an opinion poll said on
Friday.
The poll by the respected Levada Centre said 56 percent of Russians thought the "perestroika" reforms, with which
Gorbachev tried to modernise and open up Soviet life, had mainly negative results. Only 22 percent approved of them.
A separate question showed that 48 percent of Russians
thought the country would be better off if it had kept the pre-1985 system, while 36 percent thought the country could have remained a superpower without the changes.
Under the reforms, Gorbachev tried to strengthen the Soviet Union by allowing greater freedom of speech and
some private enterprise.
But the moves backfired and precipitated the Soviet collapse. Since then, the economy has slumped, leaving
millions of Russians in abject poverty.
The poll surveyed 1,600 Russians in 128 towns and cities.
ALMOST HALF OF RUSSIANS CONSIDER PERESTROIKA A FAILURE
MOSCOW, March 11. (RIA Novosti)-According to the results of a public survey conducted by the Yury Levada analytical center, only a fifth of Russians believe that the reforms initiated by Mikhail Gorbachev "were good" for Russia. At the same time, 46% agree with the statement, "It would
have been better if everything had remained as it was before perestroika," Izvestia reports.
A report from the Public Opinion Foundation, Reforms in Russia - Diagnosis and Prognosis, says the main goal of reforms was to "make life better." However, the majority of Russians are convinced that perestroika did not give them the promised "decent life," and a quarter of the population does not expect any improvement in their situation even in distant future.
A large-scale public survey conducted recently by the ROMIR Monitoring agency clearly shows that 8% of Russian families currently do not have enough money to buy food, and every third Russian family "has a hard time" buying clothes.
At the height of perestroika, sociologists from the All-Russia Center for Public Opinion Studies conducted a survey to identify the difficulties that hindered the country's development. People put "corruption and theft" (two-thirds of the respondents) in first place, "the backwardness of Russian economy" in the second, and "the bureaucracy" in third place. The fourth and the fifth places were shared by increased crime and the mistakes
made by the country's leadership. Instead of solving all these problems, perestroika only made them worse. The majority of experts believe the level of corruption in
today's bureaucracy has significantly increased compared with the Soviet period, the economy is still based on commodity exports and the lack of bureaucrats' accountability led to mass protests against the recent
benefit reform.
Therefore, it is not surprising that there is widespread nostalgia in Russian society today: 86% of Russians believe a return to the Brezhnev era is impossible,but 39% would welcome such a development, even though the main
demands of the population in 1989 (filling stores with
food and other goods, the chance to earn money) have been satisfied.
Nu, zayats, pogodi!
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