We did not have to wait long. The late 1990s and 2000s put an "end to the feast of disobedience", to quote Alexei Simonov, president of Russia's Glasnost Defence Foundation. It was the media that dealt the coup de grâce to our fear, and it was the independent media that had to die when the state, with the full co-operation of the man in the street, decided that there was too much freedom. The best and the bravest of independent journalists were murdered or sentenced after trials on trumped-up charges. Independent TV channels were closed or taken over by the state. The liberal opposition, compromised by its inability to appeal to a broader public opinion, was stifled.

To be sure, we are still very far from where we were in the 1970s. A handful of independent print media survives. Some debate - within strictly defined limits - continues.

Some vocal, albeit tiny, opposition circles still exist. Some pro-democracy NGOs, though hard-up, are still there. Vladimir Sorokin and Viktor Pelevin are allowed to publish their anti-Kremlin prose, and some penetrating political writing and historical research still appears (although history textbooks have already been "standardised" to the Kremlin's liking).

But the major, profound difference between now and then is the relationship between the intellectuals and the state. In the 1970s, the majority of the intelligentsia of whatever persuasion - nationalist, liberal and even some communists - lost their faith in the state.