AS IF TO AFFIRM the Kremlin’s fear of a revolution, mass protests broke out in cities across Russia in the winter of 2005. Tens of thousands of people were protesting a new series of measures called the “monetization of entitlements,” whereby people who received public assistance—women over fifty-five, men over sixty, early retirees, and the disabled—would no longer have access to unlimited public transportation and other in-kind benefits but would receive fixed sums of money instead.
