Studies: The Russian Tradition

This credit course is offered in English as part of the overall program, only in conjunction with the InterUniversity Centre Canada Russian Language/Culture course. Cost is $100.US.

RUSSIA IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY: IT’S PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE

Dr. Sergei P. Stepanov 
St. Petersburg State University of Finance and Economics 

TOTAL CLASS TIME: 20 ACADEMIC HOURS 

Lectures:

Part I: The present-day situation in Russia as a result of the transformations of the Soviet reality; Stalin’s industrialization and collectivization; Breshnev’s “developed socialism;” The USSR: the economy of total shortage; state monopoly, state property, state planning; “Shortage is a powerful stimulus of social relations;” Gorbachev’s cooperatives; Yeltsin’s liberalizations; “Black Tuesday;” Privatization; taxes and tax evasion; the crisis of August 17, 1998,; corruption and the shadow economy. 

Part II: The political system of the USSR and of Russia; the Communist Party of the Soviet Union; Article 6 of the Soviet constitution; elections in the USSR: “the coalition of communists and non-members of the CPSU;” the dissidents; the reformation of the Soviet political system undertaken by Gorbachev; the left-right and right-left in the USSR at the end of the 1980’s; the present day political system and situation; the legislative, executive and judiciary branches; present day electoral legislation; political parties.  

Part III: “The principle of proletarian society” as the basis for Soviet internal and international policy (Cuba, Afghanistan, etc.); their debts. 

Part IV: The social structure of Soviet society: the official doctrine and reality; the Soviet elite and pariahs; evolution of the social structure; the “New Russians.” 

Part V: Accommodations in the USSR; communal flats and “Krushchev flats;” state flats and cooperatives; resident permits; marriages of convenience; the situation in the field of accommodations nowadays. 

Part VI: The system of education: the school-leaving certificate; competition for places, the state standard, military education and training; “the distribution of young specialists;” vegetable storehouses and collective farms; the situation in the field of education now; private universities; commercialization. 

Part VII: The health-care system in the USSR: the double standard (clinics for the hoi polli and the fourth department of the ministry of health); the health-care system in Russia today; overt and covert commercialization 

Part VIII: Science, art and culture in the USSR: state ideology; state funding; state control; libraries and the shortage of books; the publishing policy; censorship; “The USSR is the country whose population that reads more than any other in the world;” the Russian winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature. 

Part IX: The Russian reformers: Krushchev, Gorbachev, Yeltsin; Krushchev’s denunciation of the “cult of Stalin;” the amnesty of political prisoners; the partial liberalization of the national economy; the Caribbean crisis; “We will bury you;” Gorbachev’s acceleration; glasnost and perestroika; Gorbachev: the leader of liberal reforms and the leader of the Communist party; the coup of August 19, 1991; Yeltsin’s reforms: the social basis for reforms, their positive results and their shortcomings; the “cocaine capitalism” of today. 

Part X: The Russian mentality: what do Russians think about their country? How do they view the country’s fundamental problems, How do they estimate what has been happening in their country since the beginning of the century? How do they envisage their country’s future?