East European Studies

Cultural and social policies are important aspects that shape and define the life of the people in a community. Since these policies directly affect how people interact, its development is pivotal to any political and economical structure. In the case of the Soviet Union, the cultural and social policies have undergone several changes from the October Revolution to 1991. The collapse of the Communist order in 1991 was attributed to the seventy-five years of widespread enthusiasm for the new and of much disorientation, disappointment, and discontent in the realm of social and cultural life. The privatization of the Russian economy seemed to be the best answer for the economy, nonetheless, a more widespread discontent emerged with the new social classes and the absence of a middle class, which is necessary for a stable market economy.
During the Soviet years, the most affected cultural and social structure was the class system. In most capitalist countries, the economic or the wealth of the person determines the class where they belong. More particularly in Russia, class is divided into the bourgeoisie, the landowners and the peasant class prior to the October Revolution. The October Revolution was highlighted as a political revolution wherein the Bolshevik Party revolt against the government and won the support of the majority of the population, which are under the worker or peasant class. This happened at the face of an intense social, political, cultural and economic crisis that struck every corner of the Russian Empire. As the hatred of the previous dominant class alleviated, the traditional Russian society was leveled out and the landowning gentry class disappeared. The peasants had seized their (landowners) lands and destroyed their homes. The bourgeoisie is also eliminated since the peasant class overthrows their economic control. The Bolsheviks, upon acquiring control and authority, had nationalized finance, industry and trade. The members of the Church were also affected by the leveling of classes. According to Riasanovsky and Steinberg, they were persecuted and almost annihilated. The members of the intelligentsia had also perished since they were in opposition to the new regime.
Peasants or the peasant class, which was the Soviet builders of socialism, were the ones who had mostly suffered and died during the First Five-Year Plan and the Second World War. To create a peasant commune, the government constructed cooperatives and collective farms, which aimed to, changed the beliefs and manners of the peasantry. As a result, the government strived harder to create corrective efforts and remedy the impoverished Russian countryside. Thus, during the Bolsheviks rule the peasants were divided into the kulaks and the rural peasants.  A new class was formed after the five-year plan constituted by the increase in the administrative and technical personneltogether with the already existing party and government bureaucracies. This was known as the privileged group, along with the new intellectuals and military officers.
In December 25, 1991, the Soviet Union collapse into fifteen independent states. Boris Yeltsin was elected as the president of the Russian Federation. Russia embraced a social capitalism form of government and abandoned its desires towards communism due to its relative failure. The privatization of the economy results to intense restratification of Russian society as private business owners and individuals acquired properties and wealth.
In this event, a new class was formed or was named, comprised by the newly emerging capitalists class. They are called nouveau riche or New Russians. They are not merely defined by the wealth they have recently acquired but also by their presumed dishonesty, selfish greed, link with corrupt political privilege and underground crime, showy consumerism, and low cultural level. This view, according to Riasanovsky and Steinberg, were fueled by the cultural past of Russian society. Specifically, the view regarding private entrepreneurship as a criminal act that was coupled with inadequate legal and ethical standards to support businesses. This view could not be avoided since most of the New Russians were typically people with connections or even positions in the government. After the 1998 financial collapse, small businesses proliferated in Russia. Russians who warned enough wages are now identifying themselves as part of the middle-class. On the other hand, there was also a high number of a growing class of dispossessed. This class includes those who are jobless, disabled, refugees from post-Soviet successor states, economic migrants and people living in cities without proper residence permits. Unemployment in Russia after 1991 had started to increase steadily, distressing living conditions such as diet, health, birthrate and life expectancy.
Today, a typical Russian handles multiple jobs to sustain his everyday needs. The number of jobless or unemployed outnumbers those with stable jobs. The gap before the rich and the poor are wider and more evident than before. The difference in power was reflected by the political and economical position in the government. Those who are in the upper stratum of the social ladder are usually members of the government and uses criminal or illegal ways to acquire wealth. Those who are considered to be in the lower class lack proper education and are subjected to the discrimination imposed by the new capitalists economy.