I agree with you about the different expectations. Putin can get away with being a dictator because the Russians have never had the experience of a well-functioning democracy.

But that is tied Russia's international history. When you need to be united against dangerous enemies, you need a strong-man ruler to suppress disagreement. And, going the other way, if domestic rule is having unpopular results like damaging the economy, then one way to get support is to tell the public the country is danger from abroad. So a paranoid view of the external world and an oppressive government are mutually reinforcing, and the Russian people, alas, have never known any other pattern.