Does it really? I believe it does, to certain degree, but only until Russia exploit those countries the same (or worse) than others did before.
What they’re doing in Ukraine isn’t imperialism, it’s self defense.
I do not agree on this one. I just believe it started as Putin’s wish to reunite USSR to its former glory. His words years ago: “The breakup of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century.”
And has your country improved? Is employment more dignified and abundant, are more people educated, class differences smaller, is infrastructure and housing being built more rapidly?
Yes, vastly improved in most regards. Employment is more meaningful nowadays (for people that are willing to work) and general standard of living improved unbelievably. Not sure if it was my country specific, but being unemployed was illegal back then. So it led to existence of jobs that were complete fake (existed just on paper, mostly jobs for friend-of-a-friend among elites) or jobs that were absolutely meaningless (like moving stuff from one place to another and then back) and time and will wasting (e.g night time security of empty warehouse). Simply put “jobs” just for the sake of not being unemployed. This stopped, because nobody would waste money on these jobs now. Some people miss them though, because they used to get paid for nothing.
Education is another example. Back then state had “assessment” on everyone and e.g. when parents were not members of communist party it was almost impossible to get to university (sometimes even high school). Now it’s on everyone’s abilities, universities are free (of both charge and prejudice) and if one is able enough, there’s nothing stopping him.
Class differences is tough question. This one did not really improve, it more like side-stepped. Nowadays there’s this kind of a few extremely rich people, followed by society divided by a bit wider scissors, but… There are options now to get better life, be it education, hard work, or even traveling abroad for work. Back then there weren’t (to my knowledge) this extremely wealthy people, but there still was quite large amount of “elites” that were way way way above everyone else. Most people were more or less forced to live just above poverty line (state controlled everything, including job transfers). Imagine waiting months to years to be able to buy stuff like fridge or washing machine (either due to lack of money or being too far in waiting list). These rules were set in stone and chance of getting oneself even one bracket above was minimal in legal manners (thus bribing thrived). Is it ideal now? Definitely not, but I wouldn’t go back.
Infrastructure and housing. Well, again it’s somewhere in between. I’d say in terms of housing it used to be “quantity above quality” back then and this one switched now. New houses (even old renovated ones) are far superior to what was standard back then. It ain’t cheap though. If you lowered your standards to previous era levels, you can still get your own house/flat pretty cheap - surprisingly nobody wants to do that, because people want fancy things. In terms of infrastructure, we’re seeing dark side of capitalism (or peoples dumbness). It’s often like this: There’s going to be new road, but city/state doesn’t really care and pick cheapest contractor. The road obviously sucks and needs to be repaired almost immediately. But the road already cost a lot, so what happens? Cheapest contractor is selected so the repair is botched too… Who doesn’t swear on roads in his country, though? Luckily other parts of infrastructure are not that bad.
Does it really? I believe it does, to certain degree, but only until Russia exploit those countries the same (or worse) than others did before.
I do not agree on this one. I just believe it started as Putin’s wish to reunite USSR to its former glory. His words years ago: “The breakup of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century.”
Yes, vastly improved in most regards. Employment is more meaningful nowadays (for people that are willing to work) and general standard of living improved unbelievably. Not sure if it was my country specific, but being unemployed was illegal back then. So it led to existence of jobs that were complete fake (existed just on paper, mostly jobs for friend-of-a-friend among elites) or jobs that were absolutely meaningless (like moving stuff from one place to another and then back) and time and will wasting (e.g night time security of empty warehouse). Simply put “jobs” just for the sake of not being unemployed. This stopped, because nobody would waste money on these jobs now. Some people miss them though, because they used to get paid for nothing.
Education is another example. Back then state had “assessment” on everyone and e.g. when parents were not members of communist party it was almost impossible to get to university (sometimes even high school). Now it’s on everyone’s abilities, universities are free (of both charge and prejudice) and if one is able enough, there’s nothing stopping him.
Class differences is tough question. This one did not really improve, it more like side-stepped. Nowadays there’s this kind of a few extremely rich people, followed by society divided by a bit wider scissors, but… There are options now to get better life, be it education, hard work, or even traveling abroad for work. Back then there weren’t (to my knowledge) this extremely wealthy people, but there still was quite large amount of “elites” that were way way way above everyone else. Most people were more or less forced to live just above poverty line (state controlled everything, including job transfers). Imagine waiting months to years to be able to buy stuff like fridge or washing machine (either due to lack of money or being too far in waiting list). These rules were set in stone and chance of getting oneself even one bracket above was minimal in legal manners (thus bribing thrived). Is it ideal now? Definitely not, but I wouldn’t go back.
Infrastructure and housing. Well, again it’s somewhere in between. I’d say in terms of housing it used to be “quantity above quality” back then and this one switched now. New houses (even old renovated ones) are far superior to what was standard back then. It ain’t cheap though. If you lowered your standards to previous era levels, you can still get your own house/flat pretty cheap - surprisingly nobody wants to do that, because people want fancy things. In terms of infrastructure, we’re seeing dark side of capitalism (or peoples dumbness). It’s often like this: There’s going to be new road, but city/state doesn’t really care and pick cheapest contractor. The road obviously sucks and needs to be repaired almost immediately. But the road already cost a lot, so what happens? Cheapest contractor is selected so the repair is botched too… Who doesn’t swear on roads in his country, though? Luckily other parts of infrastructure are not that bad.