Whither Russia? A Review of Andrei Shleifer's A Normal Country

In this review, the author reflects on the heated debates around views about Russia's postcommunist transition expressed in essays collected in new Andrei Shleifer's book, A Normal Country: Russia after Communism (Harvard University Press, 2005), which were initially published at different times during transition. She focuses on the three questions that have been in the center of the debate among academics and policymakers: What should the sequencing and the speed of reforms be? Should a country have political centralization for fiscal decentralization to be efficient? Is Russia normal? The author argues that Russia's most recent history provides convincing evidence in support of the logic of political and economic transformation as it was understood by Shleifer as early as the beginning of the 1990s.

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“A Beautiful, Tremendous Russian Book, and Other Things Too”

Canadian-American Slavic Studies ◽

10.1163/22102396-05102009 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 51 (2-3) ◽

pp. 376-397

Author(s):

Ekaterina Rogatchevskaia

Keyword(s):

Harvard University ◽

Recent History ◽

British Library ◽

Russian Art ◽

University Library ◽

Book Collecting ◽

Private And Public ◽

History Of

The British Library holds one of 65 existing copies of the first dated book printed in Muscovy by Ivan Fedorov and Petr Mstislavets, the Apostol (Acts and Epistles) (1564) and one of two known copies of Ivan Fedorov’s Primer (L’viv, 1574), which is considered by many to be the first Cyrillic book printed in Ukraine. The recent history of these books is linked to the name of the legendary Russian art critic and impresario Serge Diaghilev (1872–1929). Both titles belonged to his private book collection. A story of Diaghilev’s collection became part of the history of the British Library when in 1975 it acquired, among other books and manuscripts, his copy of the famous 1564 Apostol. Diaghilev’s copy of the 1574 Primer resurfaced at Harvard University Library, but its detailed descriptions and facsimile editions helped the British Library curator Christine Thomas, then in charge of the Russian collections, to identify a second copy, which is now held at the British Library. This article tells the story of how over 70 titles from Diaghilev’s collection of rare Russian books and manuscripts were acquired by the British Library, examines possible reasons for Diaghilev’s passion for books, and highlights other themes relevant for the history of private and public book collecting.

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GILLES KEPEL, Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2002). Pp. 454. $33.95 cloth, $15.95 paper

International Journal of Middle East Studies ◽

10.1017/s0020743804473073 ◽

2004 ◽

Vol 36 (3) ◽

pp. 512-514

Author(s):

DANIEL BRUMBERG

Keyword(s):

Southeast Asia ◽

Arab World ◽

Coming Of Age ◽

Political Islam ◽

Harvard University ◽

Recent History ◽

Islamic Studies ◽

Comprehensive Account ◽

South And Southeast Asia ◽

To Come

In the wake of 11 September 2001, the study of political Islam became a vastly more complicated enterprise. No other event in recent history demonstrated with such literal force how interconnected the phenomenon of Islamic activism—in all it forms—had become. Those scholars who had studied the Arab world suddenly had to pay attention to Iran and Turkey, and to such remote places as Pakistan and Afghanistan. Scholars of South and Southeast Asia had to consider how Indonesian and Malaysian Islam intersected with Khomeinism and Saudi Wahhabism. Thus, like it or not, 11 September set the stage for a rebirth of Islamic studies. Gilles Kepel's Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam marks this coming of age by providing a comprehensive account of the evolution of political Islam as a national, regional, and global phenomenon. No other work offers such a careful and well-written balance of analytical parsimony and empirical reach. For this reason alone, the book will be a classic for years to come.

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Deconstructing State-Owned Enterprises in Socialist China under Reform: A Scalar Examination

Environment and Planning A Economy and Space ◽

10.1068/a3749 ◽

2005 ◽

Vol 37 (4) ◽

pp. 703-722 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Fox Z Y Hu

Keyword(s):

Local Governments ◽

Structural Changes ◽

Fiscal Decentralization ◽

Growth Dynamics ◽

Economic Transformation ◽

Economic Sectors ◽

Politics Of Scale ◽

Heterogeneous Nature ◽

Path Dependent ◽

Internal Variation

Studies of economic transformation under socialism in general, and the growth and development of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in particular, have been based on the assumption that SOEs are a homogeneous entity. With few exceptions, the extant literature tends to compare SOEs as a whole with other economic sectors. Little has been written about the heterogeneous nature of SOEs. The author examines the internal variation of SOEs at different administrative levels in terms of productivity and profitability in China, which remains one of the largest socialist economies undergoing profound structural changes. The performance of SOEs is found to have varied significantly among the administrative hierarchy of the socialist political system. The changing politics of scale from promoting regional self-reliance in the Maoist era toward both expanding SOE autonomy and fiscal decentralization in the post-Maoist era, has resulted in an increase in the disparity between the SOEs affiliated with the national government and those affiliated with local governments. The investigation of SOEs in the Chinese context raises important theoretical questions concerning the growth dynamics of SOEs and suggests the need for a more careful and path-dependent treatment of socialist economies under reform. The growth of SOEs in transitional socialist economies provides an interesting testing ground in which to evaluate the theoretical discourse concerning the politics of scale and the rescaling of politics.

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