The son of a poor building worker, he had a meteoric rise through communist ranks to become party boss in the industrial city of Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg) in the Urals. Unlike most other party leaders, he was good at talking to ordinary people, a skill that helped him win support and then power later, but he also showed no sign of questioning the Marxist-Leninist gobbledygook that he was required to recite at public events.
叶利钦是前苏联体制的典型产物，这虽然使他向民主和自由市场经济的转变不够完美，但却更具奇迹性。作为一个贫穷的建筑工人的儿子，叶利钦在苏共内的职位扶摇直上，成了工业城市斯维尔德洛夫斯克市 （叶卡捷林堡）的第一书记。和其他的苏共领导人不同，他很善于和老百姓聊天，这帮他赢得了支持以及后来的权力。但是在公共场合，在他不得不引用马列主义教条的时候，他丝毫没有表现出对其有所质疑。