ABSTRACT
Before the end of 1992, monetarists were insisting that the government's financial stabilization plan had been seriously compromised, while conservatives were claiming that the Western approach to reform was a formula for Russia's economic ruin. It was widely believed in Russia that Gaidar's replacement by Viktor Chernomyrdin meant a shift in the course of economic reform. As the summer of 1993 began, a critical juncture had been reached in Russia's struggle for economic and political transformation. Opposition to Boris Yeltsin's economic initiatives was now characteristically interpreted as opposition to any economic reform and also to democracy. Economic reform was certainly one of their concerns, as was an obvious determination to help prevent a resurgence of communism in Russia. Monetarists were warning of economic decline and a feared return of the communist system if their prescription was not followed, and conservatives worried about the negative social and economic consequences of such bitter medicine.
