Why Gorbachev's legacy still threatens Putin

Little remains of the legacy of Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet leader and one of the greatest reformers in Russian history.

In the name of "glasnost" (openness) and "perestroika" (restructuring), Gorbachev dismantled totalitarianism, abolished censorship, freed hundreds of political prisoners, and held competitive elections that inaugurated a decade of democratisation.

By jettisoning the USSR's ideologi