Moscow in the 1990s: Market Reform and the Central City

The built environmental reflects in tangible ways the values of the societies of which it is a part. Soviet cities developed in accordance with the precepts of socialism for more than half a century, and nowhere were the consequences more palpable than in the central city. The present paper examines changes in urban development and management now under way in Moscow as a consequence of the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the advent of fundamental economic and political restructuring. More specifically it explores the impact of the new political economy on central Moscow's employment structure, housing stock, and land use, and assesses the attitudes of business representatives and residents to these changes. 5 figures, 2 tables, 25 references.