> The problem is - as long as the economy is fine they don't care

Personal anecdote:

In April 2010 I was protesting ratification of the so called "Kharkiv Pact" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kharkiv_Pact) in Kyiv. I remember a moment, when I was single-handedly pushing three rows of soldiers (national guard; they didn't really try) and almost no one else joined, one of the members of our group said to another: "There won't be a revolution today. Let's wait till they start losing money, then we'll try again".