Sturmer is an expert on authoritarian governments and elegantly articulates the conflict between democracy and autocracy in Russia. Insightful biographical analysis of a truly global figure, Vladimir Putin.
Michael Stuermer is professor of history at the University of Erlangen-Nurnberg. He has been a visiting professor at Harvard, the Institute of Advanced Study at Princeton, the Sorbonne, the University of Toronto and the Institute for Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. He has written and edited books on various subjects, including Europe and the Middle East.
In this concise and readable account, which follows the rise of Putin in Russian politics to the end of his final term as President, Stuermer (history, Univ. of Erlangen-N rnberg) writes of Russia cautiously moving into mainstream Europe; in recent years, the EU-Russian relationship has embraced the contradiction between economic partnership and political misgivings. First published in the United Kingdom in 2008, this volume suffers from a lack of timeliness, even with an added postscript. Stuermer does not address the 2009 energy price decreases and the global economic downturn. However, as a recap of Russia's position in the political and economic arena of Western Europe, it is unparalleled. Anna Politkovskaya's Putin's Russia, Lilia Shevtsova's Putin's Russia, and Andrew Jack's Inside Putin's Russia all seem to focus on the cost of Putin discarding democracy, while Stuermer takes the approach that that was necessary and explains how Russia is coping with the hybrid system. VERDICT Recommended for beginning students of contemporary Russian history, casual readers interested in European energy politics, and high school students studying world politics.-Harry Willems, Central Kansas Lib. Syst., Great Bend Copyright 2009 Reed Business Information.
Historian Stuermer attempts to shed light on Vladimir Putin's 2000-2008 presidency and his vision for a new Russia in this thorough but poorly organized and overly complex book. Putin is "a man from nowhere," an understated and effective KGB agent turned city administrator who moved from near-anonymity to the presidency in a few years. Putin is portrayed as both insider and outsider, but untrammeled by the political infighting and corruption of the post-Soviet Russian political machine. He quickly showed his mettle: revitalizing Russian industry, upgrading a decaying military and shifting top positions from the hands of career bureaucrats to former intelligence officers, producing a government of unparalleled obscurity. This book could have been an invaluable guide for Americans-post-Soviet Russia remains a major global force yet is woefully misunderstood by Westerners complacent after "winning" the cold war. But basic facts about Putin and post-Soviet Russia are glossed over, leaving the layperson to wade through a labyrinth of unfamiliar names, government agencies and corporations. Readers who manage to make sense of all this will find that the author's analyses of Russia's changing demographics, its status as a nuclear power and the future of its petroleum-based economy insightful and, often, troubling. (Oct.) Copyright 2009 Reed Business Information.
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