Background information: This is an excerpt from a speech given by Russian President Boris Yeltsin when he resigned from office i
n 1999. I want to ask you for forgiveness, because many of our dreams have not been realized, because what we thought would be easy turned out to be painfully difficult. I ask for forgiveness for not fulfilling some hopes of those people who believed that we would be able to jump from the grey, stagnating, totalitarian past into a bright, rich and civilized future in one go. I myself believed in this. It seemed that with one spurt we would overcome everything . But it could not be done in one fell swoop. In some respects I was too naive.
–President Boris Yeltsin,
1999
What does Yeltsin’s speech say about Russia’s transition to capitalism?
Russia will successfully create a capitalist
system in the future
The shift from communism to capitalism was harder than anyone anticipated.
Russia was trying to change too quickly and needed to return to communism.
Against all odds, Russia successfully created a capitalist system.
