Capitalism Russian-Style

Capitalism Russian-Style provides a progress report on the building of capitalism in Russia.

Thane Gustafson (Author)

9780521641753, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 18 November 1999

282 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.9 cm, 0.59 kg

'Gustafson has provided us with a highly readable book that will serve as a leading Analysis of the political economy of the Yeltsin era.' International Affairs

For a decade Russia has been dismantling communism and building capitalism. Describing a deeply flawed fledgling market economy, Capitalism Russian-Style provides a progress report on one of the most important economic experiments going on in the world today. It describes Russian achievements in building private banks and companies, stock exchanges, new laws and law courts. It analyzes the role of the mafia, the rise of new financial empires, entrepreneurs and business tycoons, and the shrinking Russian state. Thane Gustafson tells how the Soviet system was dismantled and the new market society was born. He argues that this new society is changing constantly, so that any assessment of success and failure would be premature. Identifying investment as vital to preserving Russia's status as a major industrial power, in his final chapter he examines the prospects for an economic miracle in Russia in the twenty-first century.

1. Revolution or 'crony capitalism'?
2. Insider privatization and its consequences
3. Wall Street comes to Moscow
4. The Russian banks come of age
5. No capitalism without capitalists
6. The epidemic of crime
7. Toward the rule of law
8. Beyond coping: the recovery of society
9. The shrinking state and the battle for taxes
10. Conclusion: halfway to market.

Subject Areas: Political economy [KCP]