He also saved it too by standing up to the attempted hardliners coup against Gorbachev and helped to negotiate a largely peaceful dissolution to the Soviet Union. Yeltsin's political career was very checkered but I don't think it can be considered universally bad or good.
Sishir, I suppose I'll just say I see Soviet history differently. One analyst on the radio charaterized Yeltsin as a wrecking ball (in a good way), and I think that is an accurate description, but I don't see it as a good thing. Gorbachev was much more deft in keeping a complicated system operating while changing it a piece at a time. It is as though Yeltsin decided that was too hard and it'd be easier to start from scratch. No finesse. That probably makes Gorbachev a better technocrat, but I see him more as a visionary with skills. I don't think Gorbachev mismanaged the transition, except by pushing a little too hard on liberalization. The Chinese model is working better than Gorbachev's, maintaining political order while modernizing the economy. Gorbachev tried to do both at the same time, which proved too destabilizing. I don't knock Yeltsin or Gorbachev for losing control -- the problem was bigger than the both of them and I'm impressed by what both of them did manage to accomplish. As for Putin, what gains they've made economically (which I think are inadequate anyway) do not justify the trade-offs in freedoms and corruption they've made. Some Russians do like the way things are going, but what can I say? -- they're wrong to think so. People have also been pining for the days of Stalin when the USSR was a great power with a strong leader. That's dumb. Stalin was the reason they are as behind as they are. In the same vein, I think Yeltsin and Gorbachev catch more flak than they deserve because they are the ones seen as responsible for Russia's faltering status. No mind that the USSR had already sunk itself in the previous couple of decades and Yeltsin and Gorchachev were the ones to try to do something about it. Don't put too much stock in the opinions of the people. The people elected Bush and supported the Iraq War. Now they've flip-flopped. They've got dumb-asses in Russia too. As a postscript, don't give Yeltsin too much credit for defeating the coup. The coup was a very dumb move that pretty much defeated itself. Yeltsin had the politcal savvy to capitalize on it.
Gorbachev was definately a visionary but was still limited by his own background as soviet technocrat. What he lacked was a feeling for politics to manage the change and seemed to feel that things could progress in an ordered manner. He was unprepared for the pace at which things started to unravel. Yeltsin was a far better politician and was more prepared to deal with the sudden political changes than Gorbachev. The problem with Yeltsin though was that he was practically incompetant when it came to running a country and while he understood the need to make bold moves he failed in dealing with how those moves needed to be managed. History might end up looking kinder on them than Russians that lived through the dissolution. The problem I see with a lot of criticism of Putin is that we are looking at him through our western perspective. From our standpoint Putin is terrible but from the standpoint of Russians who had to deal with the economic and social chaos that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union having a strong man in charge is a welcome relief and something that Russians have lived with for hundreds of years.
Sishir, where do you get your information that the Russians like Putin? From what I can tell, there is not really a free press over there anymore. And most of the credible opposition has been silenced. So I'm not sure how you can claim that Putin enjoys popular support. It's kind of like when Saddam Hussein would be re-elected by 99% of the voters.
^ I don't have polling data if you're asking me but from what I've heard of news coverage and even talking to some Russians and people who have been to Russia it seems like Russians overall like Putin and prefer him over Yeltsin. While Putin is cracking down the Russian press is much freer than Iraq under Saddam and probably freer than the PRC.
Here is a link to a poll conducted last summer giving Putin a 77% approval rating from a quick google search. http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/index.cfm/fuseaction/viewItem/itemID/12411 I can't vouch for the methodology though. Here's another article stating that many Russians support Putin. http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/03/30/putin/
Check out Freedom House's free press rankings for 2006 . Russia is ranked 157, or "Not Free." Per Freedom House, press freedom has declined steadily under Putin's reign. Of course Putin and his cronies are the main beneficiaries - it means a lot less negative coverage of things like the war in Chechnya then when compared to Yeltsin's era. I'm sure that there are people in Russia who prefer Putin to Yeltsin. Certainly the economy is stronger, but how much of that is due to improved commodity prices since the 1990s? And as others have pointed out, Russia of the 1990s had to endure the the shock of transition from a communist regime to a market-driven economy.
^ I'm not arguing whether I think Putin is more or less authoritarian. I agree he is. Again though whether we think Putin is good for Russia apparently most Russians feel is.
Part of the problem is that he has established state control of the media, so people in Russia only hear how wonderful he is.
