After the collapse of the USSR, newly independent Russia struggled to create functioning state institutions amid social and economic turmoil. Two centres of power emerged, whose antagonism culminated in the violent clash between president Boris Yeltsin and the Supreme Soviet in late September to early October 1993. The crisis, and the potent imagery of a parliament building being shelled by its own army, is often identified as a key moment in the development of the modern Russian state.

According to many observers, Yeltsin transgressed his presidential powers and, with his violent repression of parliamentary opposition and a new presidentialist constitution, nipped Russian democracy in the bud - thus laying the foundation for the authoritarian state capitalism of his handchosen successor Vladimir Putin. Russian liberals have tended to defend Yeltsin’s course of action, claiming it saved Russia from civil war and a full power grab by old Soviet elites with unpredictable economic and geopolitical consequences.

The workshop is organised by the head of the Junior Research Group ‘Peripheral Liberalism’ Dr Tobias Rupprecht. If you wish to attend in-person or online, please register with George Payne: g.payne@fu-berlin.de.