A weekly, Profil, asked experts to comment on the reason for this view.
Mikhail Delyagin, director of the Institute for Globalization Problems:
"Someone who neither has nor can afford a stake in an oil major, which is the case with most Russians, does not perceive these papers as private property. After all, few apartments, cars, or TVs have ever been confiscated in post-Soviet Russia, whereas grabbing production assets has become a commonplace practice. Now the state is doing what only businessmen did in the past. People think the state grabs shares and factories because it does not perceive them as private property."
Yevgeny Gontmakher, chief expert at the Center for Social Studies:
"A radical change in popular attitudes toward private property is highly unlikely to happen in the short term because the concept of private property is linked to big businesses and oligarchs - a notion the authorities have unfortunately failed to dispel. Russia already has a stock market where people are free to buy shares, but propaganda says that doing so would mean crossing a line between two social camps, when you would cease to be an 'honest worker.' The majority of ordinary people think in Soviet stereotypes, which hold that share ownership means making money out of nothing, or indulging in speculation."
Vladimir Golovnyov, co-chairman of Delovaya Rossiya (Business Russia):
"Private property has not been institutionalized in Russia mostly because of the authorities' mismanagement. For example, private property has been untouchable in Germany under any system of power, even under the Nazis. It has always been the fundamental of fundamentals. In Russia, the situation has been different: A new set of power starts with selecting what it wants. Businessmen see that administrative clout can be used as leverage in ownership disputes, which certainly does not encourage them to strengthen private property."
