There are two aspects in the events of 1991, each of which can be called both a negative “catastrophe” and a positive “revolution”: this is the death of the “socialist experiment” and the collapse of the “imperial” USSR, the latter being a derivative of the former. For an objective understanding of the significance of these events, they must be considered in the context of long-term institutional socioeconomic changes (first of all, the evolution from industrial to post-industrial society) and taking into account the modern theories of the sociology of revolutions. This approach leads to the conclusion that the main content of the events of 1991 is an objectively progressive “anti-nomenclature” (antipolitical) revolution that took place “from above” (and therefore very inconsistent). It put an end to the Soviet system, which claimed to present “real socialism”, but in fact turned out to be the “second edition” of the so-called Asiatic mode of production, and therefore, despite many “mobilization” achievements, it reached a dead end. Since the ex-Soviet “nomenklatura” was able to largely maintain (and in some aspects even strengthen) its privileged position, this creates a public demand for a new cycle of revolutionary events.