Russian politics and society /

This volume is an extremely comprehensive study of Russian government and politics in the years immediately before and after the collapse of the Soviet Union. There is no strong overall theoretical framework. Rather, the reader is given a factual account of what happened during the period with brief references to concepts like sovereignty, political culture, and democratization. Since the focus is on Russia, rather than the former Soviet Union, discussion of the 14 other newly independent countries is largely confined to one chapter. The book is best suited to a reader who has a fairly good knowledge of the former Soviet Union. Given the detailed nature of the discussion, the beginning reader might easily become overwhelmed by the amount of factual information presented. On the other hand, the wealth of factual information would make the book a good reference source for events (primarily in Russia) leading up to and following the collapse of the Soviet Union.