ABSTRACT
The glasnost and perestroika policies that Soviet Union President Mikhail Gorbachev introduced in the 1980s triggered the release of internal forces, which, by December 1991, split the Soviet Union into 15 independent republics and indirectly led to the rise to power of Vladimir Putin. Collapse of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) in 1991 made it necessary to replace the Soviet-era constitution with one that reflected the shrunken state of the remaining Russian Federation (RF). Under Putin's presidency, it has become increasingly important for the current political elite to reach an agreement on a national idea that will preserve the gains that the country has achieved over the years of his administration. Russia in a post-Soviet world appears to once again be aggressively undergoing a campaign for what it believes is its natural place in the world: an equal geopolitical partner with the United States, China and the EU in a multipolar world.
