Russian Railway Transport in the Late XX – Early XXI Centuries: Towards a Historiography of Transitional Reforms

Railway transport is an essential link in the chain of a state’s economic development, indirectly influencing the intensification of this process. As it permeates the entire state system, it is influenced by political, economic, and social factors. In the late 20th century, there were significant changes as the Soviet Union was replaced by the Russian Federation in the political arena. These events were accompanied by profound economic and social upheavals. At the beginning of the 21st century, the process of forming and strengthening the new Russian state continued. These events had a significant impact on the functioning of the country’s transportation sector. The aim of this article is to identify and analyze research on the activities of the railway transport system in the USSR and the Russian Federation during one of the most difficult periods in Russian history. This article substantiates the relevance of the research problem and provides a historiographical analysis of the discovered works using ideographic, comparative, and typological methods. The article concludes on the significance of the identified studies for the development of the history of Russian railway transport in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.