Stalin will always be a major figure with positive, as high positives, as well as negative views in Russia. Many people who have this partial or even more than partial admiration for Stalin know the crimes he committed and they still nonetheless have these feelings of admiration for him. But I'm also not surprised that a significant plurality still finds some reasons to admire him through all that bloodshed.
Historian and author Stephen Kotkin of Princeton University and Stanford University's Hoover Institution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the historical significance of the life and work of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Solzhenitsyn's birth.