Since 1991, there have been two major phases in Russian history, corresponding roughly to the decades of the 1990s and the 2000s.  Under President Boris Yeltsin (1991-1999), Russia attempted a rapid transition to a market economy and liberal democracy.  Economic “shock therapy,” the transition from a planned and centralized economy to a privatized market economy in one leap, proved to be traumatic for most of the population of the Russian Federation.  On the positive side, these initial years of post-Soviet Russia saw the creation of a new system of laws, a dramatic rise in political participation, the birth of new human rights institutions at the national level, and the establishment of non-governmental organizations (NGOs).  Yet, the political transition, liked the economic one, proved to be very turbulent, perhaps inevitably in a situation where a country with Russia’s authoritarian past attempts to introduce a multi-party democracy.  The country’s political culture seemed a poor fit for its new democratic constitution.