Agriculture and the State in Soviet and Post-Soviet Russia (Pitt Series in Russian and East European Studies)

by Stephen K. Wegren

Release Date: August, 1998

Edition: Hardcover

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Indispensable

Wegren's book is a comprehensive and detailed analysis of the post-Soviet agricultural reforms in Russia. He successfully argues that the Russian state is not "weak" compared to its Soviet counterpart, but that it is still stronger than other components of society, thus creating numerous barriers to the development of an expanding free market in the rural areas. His archival, fieldwork and anecdotal information make this a tremendous contribution to the social sciences.

enough of the tired academic approach and prose

Alas, this could have been a book filled with enlightening explorations of the endless catastrophe called Russian/Soviet agriculture. Instead, we get tired recitations of fact mixed with analytical reviews of theories that lead the reader away from exactly the places where most readers will probably want to go -- to the farms of the ex-USSR, where real people are struggling with a monumentally inefficient system that's all but collapsed under its own weight. Can't this book give us a glimpse into that rality, rather than the mental constructs of the western academics? We'll have to wait for a better book to come along and help us out.