I use git day to day and before that used svn for a number of years. Now on the odd codebase, I tend to find svn is still in use, and I don't mind that, I just work with it.
From what you've mentioned, it does not seem that introducing git in your organization was solving a problem per-se, you "could" have the exact same flow you had with svn in git, have a single branch and call it whatever you like, e.g. "master", "develop", whatever...
What I think is happening is that someone didn't like the process you had and tried to solve/replace that with a more modern way, e.g. having feature branch, release branches, master, etc... and that it easier to technically achieve with git than with svn. Imagine doing what you doing now with svn, that'd be a nightmare, wouldn't?
On the other hand, your "new" workflow might be solving problems that you didn't realize you had. I.e. code review and approvals have the great benefit of having a 2nd pair of eyes reviewing your changes as well as spreading the knowledge throughout the team as to what's been changing, more like keeping a pulse... so that is not necessarily a bad thing.