Modern Day St. Petersburg

During the 1970’s and early 1980’s there was a period of stability for the city of Leningrad, and the population enjoyed relative prosperity. A new revolution, this time in Moscow, brought reforms known worldwide as Perestroika, and again stability rapidly disappeared and the population began experiencing economic hardship as the government quibbled over reforms. In 1991, a city-wide referendum agreed to return the city of Leningrad to its original name Saint Petersburg.

By the end of the 1990’s, after the August 1998 financial crash, St Petersburg’s plight was abysmal and apparently hopeless. The city received only 5% of all foreign investment (while Moscow gathered 80%), the city faced bankruptcy, the federal government shut down the city’s only national broadcasting station; and the most talented people in town fleeing for Moscow, Europe or America. The once Imperial capital was reduced to a crumbling provincial town.

However at the turn of the century that all changed when Vladimir Putin was appointed as Russia’s prime minister and then president. Today St Petersburg is a boom town, and once again becoming one of the most fashionable places in Europe thanks to its rich cultural, economic and technological potential. On the social side, St Petersburg’s younger generations are coping well with the economic conditions, but unemployment remains high and families and pensioners struggle to make ends meet.