Abstract

After 1989, in the USSR, a number of non-Communist figures identifying themselves as “democratsµ gathered in parliamentary groups, parties, and civil society organizations representing the most diverse liberal, conservative, and populist demands. Although they had different agendas, they were united by the desire to dismantle the political monopoly of the CPSU. The Interregional Group and the Democratic Russia movement (DemRossiya) became the unifying landmarks, forming variable-geometry coalitions around the figure of Boris Yeltsin and taking divergent positions on the economic and social reforms. However, the main challenge that compromised the unity of the Russian democratic movement in 1991 was the federal question. The collapse of the Soviet Union and the Chechen crisis exacerbated the debates and formalized the first splits in the movement, distancing a part of Russian nationalism that broke with Yeltsin and moved closer to those national groups that claimed greater autonomy