Papers > By author > Dzarasov Ruslan

The concept of "development of underdevelopment", suggested by A.G. Frank, assumed that dependent societies are transformed by the dominating countries in the two key aspects. Firstly, their economies are reduced to a few industries, meeting demand of the metropolies. Secondly, their class structure is changed in two respects: (a) peasantry is deprived of land to provide cheap labour; and (b) comprador bourgeoisie is created from the local landlord class. Transformation of Russia and other former Soviet societies in Post-Soviet period closely resembles this picture. Degeneration of their manufacturing sector reduced their relatively diversified economies to suppliers of energy resources and some semi-processed goods to the world market. On the other hand, these societies went through transformation of their social structures. Impoverishment of population created a pool of cheap labour. At the same time, former state beaurocracy, criminal underworld and liberal intelligentsia created the new possessing class, closely associated with Western capital. This system proved to be inefficient but quite stable in the medium term. However, the Great Stagnation and geopolitical show-off with the West put this system under severe stress.