How are the Russians celebrating the centennial of the Revolution?

The Elcano Royal Institute is a think-tank for international and strategic studies that analyses world events and trends from a Spanish, European and global perspective.

The Analyses of the Elcano Royal Institute (ARI)are short pieces - of around 3,000 words - on aspects of current international affairs considered to be of relevance to Spain, its foreign policy or its security. In broad terms ARIs are intended to have a predictive bearing on events.For the current Russian government, the 100th anniversary of the Revolution is not a happy occasion. The Kremlin links the surge of the Bolsheviks to power to State weakness and to political and social disorder, the reoccurrence of which should not be tolerated.

Nevertheless, since Vladimir Putin took office in 2000, the regime has rehabilitated the historical figure of Joseph Stalin (1878-1953) and in 2016 inaugurated monuments to Ivan the Terrible (1530-84) and Catherine the Great (1729-96), and to Prince Vladimir, who accepted, in his own name and in those of all his subjects, the faith of Byzantine Orthodox Christianity in 988. These four figures –all very different from one another– embody the autocratic, centralised and expansionist state model, based on the values of the Orthodox Church.

The attitude of the Russians towards the historical legacy of the Revolution is ambiguous and confused, leading to a sense of apathy with respect to the current regime, as revealed by the Levada Centre surveys, conducted every October since 1990.

• Primary Source

100th anniversary of the October Revolution http://www.europeansources.info/record/100th-anniversary-of-the-october-revolution/

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