Transitional Citizens: Voters and What Influences Them in the New Russia By Timothy J. Colton. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000. 324p. $65.00 cloth, $24.95 paper. Unexpected Outcomes: Electoral Systems, Political Parties, and Representation in Russia Robert G. Moser. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2001. 183p. $19.95.

Extract

As the Soviet regime recedes farther into the past, two types of scholars are now working hard to put the post-Soviet experience in comparative context. Some are those who built their careers on a study of the Soviet Union and have now significantly expanded on their work, while another group comprises scholars of the post-Soviet regime who completed their dissertations after the collapse of the Communist regime. These two books represent some of the best of both of these groups, and both are important in their scope in bringing Russian politics into one of the most important fields in politics, namely, that of elections, parties, and voters.