Video: Brian Whitmore on the Reset, Stalin, and Russia’s Rising Expectations
During our last visit to Prague, we had the pleasure of meeting up for a chat with Brian Whitmore, senior correspondent at Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty and one of the authors of the excellent Russia blog, The Power Vertical. Brian is a veteran reporter with many years on the ground over in Moscow, writing for the Moscow Times and then heading up the Boston Globe bureau throughout the 1990s and early 2000s. He was reporting from the “frontlines,” so to speak, during some of Russia’s most turbulent years, and has a lot of interesting stories and perspectives to share.
In the video interview below (my apologies for the poor lighting), we cover a wide range of general questions … Whitmore believes in the potential success of the reset policy, he notes that Russia’s economic modernization has become hostage to its unchanging political system, and that the greatest risks posed to the ruling order is the discontent arising out of “rising expectations and relative deprivation.” Interesting stuff.
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