Memes aside, why is Russia so corrupt, poor, and backwards...

Memes aside, why is Russia so corrupt, poor, and backwards? They have everything to be a relatively wealthy and prosperous country, but since the founding of the Tsardom in the 16th century, Russia has been a country of poorfags ruled over by a parasitic elite. Of course, this is the case in every country, but in places like the UK, the elite throw more scraps to the masses.

Attached: russia-russian-federation-5-x-3-flag-2862-p.jpg (784x517, 24K)

>but since the founding of the Tsardom in the 16th century, Russia has been a country of poorfags ruled over by a parasitic elite
Just as any other country of the era. Come on dude, it's like you've never read Dickens.

Of course mate, but our elite made a willing and conciouss choice to change that. But even the children in dickens had an easier life than Russians peasantry. Russian peasants were the most mistreated peasants probably in all of Europe, they even fled to the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth, which was also another society that treated peasants like specs of shit.
You were, if my memory hasn't failed me, the last major Euorpean power to get rid of serfdom.

Do you know the orcs from the LOTR series and Warhammer? Yeah, the Russians are the real life equivalent of those.

>e, but our elite made a willing and conciouss choice to change that.
Yeah, now indians do the shitty job and not englishmen.
>But even the children in dickens had an easier life than Russians peasantry
Not really. The only big advantage was school education.
>You were, if my memory hasn't failed me, the last major Euorpean power to get rid of serfdom.
As far as I recall, there were also german kingdoms.
The reasons that serfdom was abolished so late are very different and difficult to sum up in one post.
But it was determined by the troubles of economical development of the Empire, which stretch back to the days of Mongol Yoke and Dniepr trade route.

My theory is that the constant threat and raids of horsefuckers served to empower the military elite, aka the nobility to a much larger degree than elsewhere. you are more willing to give up rights in exchange in protection as a peasant if tatars want to burn down your village.
that continued until technological progress made the threat irrelevant but by that time serfdom was deeply entrenched. while some weak tsars gave into some popular demands, strong ones rolled them back untill everything fell apart when the commies took over.
from that point on its lingering commie missmanagement and the seperation between russia and the west that resulted through the cold war.

>dickens
>basing your worldview on works of fiction

>Yeah, now indians do the shitty job and not englishmen.
Indians are one of the wealthiest minorities in the country.
Even the shit jobs in the country allow you reach a decent-ish existence. You're not going to starve or beg in the streets like Russian peasants did. You seem quite in denial about your history, so there's no point going any further.

My view is actually quite similar to yours, but I just wante to see what others thought.

Dickens actually made many of our politicians and ruling elite more sympathetic to poor people, which led to reforms.

>As far as I recall, there were also german kingdoms.

we got rid of it much sooner than you. peasant uprising removed in many german states and whatever form of serdom remained got removed when napolean swept through europe. he didnt conquer russia though so you could enjoy serfdom for another century.

Every work of fiction is reflecting real life to some degree. The life of an average european child was tough until 20th century even outside of Dickens and Eugene Sue's works.
>Indians are one of the wealthiest minorities in the country.
In the modern days, yeah.
>Even the shit jobs in the country allow you reach a decent-ish existence. You're not going to starve or beg in the streets like Russian peasants did
Goddamn, I like it when people compare 19th century agrarian Russia to 21st century England or 16th century Japan to 19th century France.
>You seem quite in denial about your history, so there's no point going any further.
And you seem to be full of shit. I don't deny that Russian Empire's peasantry was miserable. But not just because of some landlord's ill will. Everything was economically determined, and if you say that the only power that moves history is just human will, then read a fucking book.
Alritght, I got it.

if we speak about nowadays russians are generally rather lazy, it's a common consequence of a socialistic regime btw. they also didn't have much time to improve since the soviet union collapsed and the soviet union corrupted everything hard, russia had to rebuild its economy from scratches since its industry wasn't viable in the market economy. then they didn't get used to democracy yet and supported some supposed stability in exchange for putin's autocracy

also you don't know much about its history. heck, you didn't even heard about peter the great if you claim crap like
>They have everything to be a relatively wealthy and prosperous country, but since the founding of the Tsardom in the 16th century, Russia has been a country of poorfags ruled over by a parasitic elite.
probably didn't heard about ivan the terrible either if you praise the pre-romanovs era

russia emerged as a major european power back in the end of 17th - beginning of 18th century with peter the great reforms and it was pretty successful for a while, its elite was at least partially a meritocracy till the very end btw, even if the system got corrupt eventually, even a peasant could get a personal and even a hereditary nobility (nobility was linked to getting a certain civil or military rank or a military decoration) etc. its problems began again somewhat in the end of 18th and the beginning of 19th century because it couldn't follow the much needed social reforms like getting a constitutional monarchy or a democracy, it lingered for too long with freeing serfs too. it all sowed the seeds that were riped by bolsheviks. sadly since the december revolt in 1825 failed and the tsardom was vehemently against much needed reforms till it became too late. eventually a large war sparkled a revolution and it turned out to be the most disastrous revolution ever, still it could turn out much better if not for stalin, lenin re-introduced elements of market economy before his death but stalin had closed that

Attached: 7f108a49b799de4c871ab0eaa436762299cba7fa[1].jpg (800x800, 49K)

This is a good thread

They were actually very wealthy during the 1970s, sometimes getting close to the US in gdp. Then the union fell but Russia still has a ton of potential to be rich. The real problem is that Putin decided that a geopolitical gain (crimea) was more important than economic growth, so he invaded Ukraine and got sanctioned the fuck out of by the west.

GDP /= wealth or standard of living for average person.
Soviet citizens never lived anywhere close as good as Americans.
I am aware of those rulers. I know you had progressive rulers that made reforms, which were later stifled by later rulers because of incidents. I would argue that the reason the revolution happened is because the Tsar clamped down on reforms in reaction to assasinations.

Didn't carnaged biotrash. That's why.

imo putin is like stalin, tries to keep the personal power on the cost of the whole country, he needed a move liek that crimea annexation to boost his personal rating that was pretty low in the beginning of 10ss when he even had to fly with siberian cranes on an ultra light aircraft etc stupid shit

Putin needs to keep power at all costs as otherwise he will get destroyed. As soon as he loses power, his enemies will anihilated him.

he was free to quit several years ago it's still unlikely something bad happens to him if he loses power right now unless it happens as a result of a some kind of revolt

He has pissed of many rich and powerful people.

In Russia? That's his cabal.

While he has power.

Now I feel like a cunt bashing Russian posters all the time
Maybe I just find shit threads

It’s still trying to recover from communism, give them a couple decades and they’ll be up to date. Just need to rid themselves of the oligarchs and KGPutin and replace it with a more democratic and transparent system.

Unfortunately since they played the international bad guy in the 20th century they never were able to join the EU and be modernised (not saying the EU is good now but it wasn’t that bad 30 or so years ago especially for Slavic nations)
Poland and co would gone the same way if no one gave them a hand. And because Russia weren’t allowed/didn’t join the EU they have only strayed further from the light. Like Turkey have in recent times since they got declined from the EU

geography is their biggest obstacle to pass, especialöly because their most vital parts of economy are on the european shelf which unfortunately lays on a flat pllain
from several invasion and raids from the past they got paranoid aout europe and china/mongols

WW2 really fucked them in the head.

>still it could turn out much better if not for stalin

Attached: 1533170432270.png (190x266, 5K)

That’s why they was always behind historically due to how spread out the was population (therefore hurting innovation). But with modern technology that should be less of a challenge but I can see everything east of the Urals bringing the HDI down, I doubt the West is that bad.
Reason why I don’t like the EU is due to the size of it and how it used it’s power (like any large group would) to take Ukraine. Ukraine at the time was offering Russia access to a warm water port (Crimea) which Russia didn’t have and without it meant they couldn’t trade every day of the year.
Russia was forced into taking the Crimea via questionable methods and then they got sanctioned for it to boost the pockets of EU businessmen who filled the pockets of EU politicians in return.
It’s all one massive shitshow and the sooner it breaks up the better

>boost the pockets of EU businessmen who filled the pockets of EU politicians in return
in what way are businessmen profiting from sanctions? they actually complain about them and want them gone

>tfw wage slave in the U.K.
>tfw live like a king in russia
Feels good desu

The only money sink is the women, am I rite fellas

curbing the international trade fills the pockets of nobody

International business in general suffers yeah but say for example Ivan sells cameras to Poland for £100. But Hans from Austria also sells cameras to Poland but for £105 making his product less competitive in Poland.
But say an opportunity arises where Hans can have a talk with an EU official, accidentally losing a breifcase full of cash in the process about his camera sales. Suddenly Ivan is banned from selling to the the EU (including Poland) because there’s some ‘reliable information’ of him money laundering in 1995, then magically Hans is the cheapest camera salesmen in Poland.

Obviously in reality Hans and Ivan are major corporations and cameras are a multitude of millions of units of various goods and services but the principle remains the same. The everyday man has to pay extra and the original product/service ends up lacking in quality due to lack of competitiveness.
But the funny thing is that the sanctioner will spin this off as doing the right thing and retards across the world will praise it

Well as I said in the above paragraph it’s only for the benefit of the paid politician and specific corporation who loses his competition. Retards will however praise sanctions and in the case even more stupidly as Russia was forced into this Crimean affair

your example is plausible
but russias exports to europe are fossile ressource based and on top of that russia cut off its markets from europe, so businessmen bite their asses since they lost a market of approx 150 mln possible customer

Bump.

You weren't a landlocked huge-ass country either.

russia wasn't land-locked since the times of peter the great
i mean it wasn't rally landlocked before that too since it had an access to the white sea but still, peter 1st gave it an access to the baltic sea too and created its navy

*really

Because Russia doesn't know what's democracy, they went from Czarism to communism to the corrupt government they have now.

Because during the comi era the national conglomerates were huge and state owned and when communism fell it was bought by a few people who had money and influence at the time which means it was bought by previous communist officials and buy the only people who had money had the time who were mafia who got rich by dealing in the black market during the commi era.

Because natural resources are a huge part of their economy which means political instability because the people who control these are invincible compared to other citizens of this country so they shape the country as they want, if your institutions are weak natural resources are a bad thing for you country

>Because Russia doesn't know what's democracy

i want to remind you that korea used to have some authoritarian presidents too...

you also rather simplify how the russian privatization went