ABSTRACT
The increase in inequality that Russia has experienced since 1992 is significant because it represents a fault line that is deeper and more widespread than that which existed in the USSR. The Soviet Union was divided by ethnicity and regional differences, as well as other factors. Among them, Soviet Russia experienced an elite/mass divide in privilege and lifestyle, as discussed in Chapter 1. Before Gorbachev the party elite tried to conceal stratification between it and the masses in order to prevent social discontent. Needless to say, the elite were not fully successful, and the gulf between it and common citizens was known to virtually everyone. 1 Common people were aware of the privileges enjoyed by the elite, and under Gorbachev the ability to conceal privilege and manage its ramifications declined significantly, which led to increased resentment. For example, for the first time in Soviet society the press openly criticized the wife of the general secretary, Raisa Gorbachev, for her shopping trips in Paris. Popular opinion polls indicated that the Soviet system was considered corrupt, and the distribution of income and the privileged status of Soviet officialdom were perceived as unjust. 2 As long as the party elite remained unified and retained a strong coercive apparatus – along with the will to use coercion – these social cleavages did not manifest themselves to the point that system survival was threatened. Public resentment over inequality never transformed into a significant challenge to the system; for all the misery that the Soviet consumer endured and the injustice he felt, the system did not fall because of inequality. In the end, the Soviet Union dissolved because of intra-party dispute and the erosion of elite solidarity.
