AP Photo

In just six months, from the end of September 2011 to March 2012, Russia was transformed. The state’s gradual decomposition – its degenerate ethos of rent-seeking and appropriation of public goods – finally pushed Russia’s citizens, especially its young post-communist middle class, into the streets. Soviet-era deference to paternalistic leaders gave way to self-confidence and distrust of established authority.

Or did it?