Traditsii i nasledie russkogo prava by O. A. Omel'chenko (review)

Abstract

REVIEWS 189 The book isnot always an easy read, nor is the editing always up to scratch. Nevertheless, it isa valuable contribution to our understanding of the complex patterns of capitalism that have arisen from the rubble of Soviet-type Communism. TransformationofCommunistSystems Project Robert F. Miller Research School ofPacific andAsian Studies The Australian National University Omel'chenko, O. A. Traditsii i nasledierusskogo prava. Opera Omnia, 2.MGIU, Moscow, 2006. 492 pp. Notes. Bibliography. Price unknown. Comparative lawyers have been according Russian law short shrift these days. In his influential Legal Traditions of the World (3rd edn, Oxford, 2007) Patrick Glenn, having given theRussian law tradition threeparagraphs inhis treatise, dismisses it as 'brute force' unworthy of more attention. All the more reason why leading modern Russian legal historians such as Omel'chenko need to make their labours available to a wider audience. The volume under review is the second of twelve intended to encompass the 'Opera Omnia' of the author. There isan uncommon bibliophilic bent to Omel'chenko, fornot only is the volume attractively designed, but fiftyof the 220 copies printed are signed and numbered by the author for those fortunate enough to receive a copy. The volume, which consists of essays, chapters, encyclopedia articles and notes written and/or published during the past two decades invarious media, many revised for thisoccasion, isdivided into four parts. The firstand longest comprises fourteen surveys of the 'historyof legislation of old Russia', ranging from theRusskaia Pravda, to the Sudebniks, Sobornoe ulozhenie, Kormchaia kniga, the Zertsalo, Catherine's Nakaz and concomitant reform schemes, the Svod zakonov, 1864 judicial reforms, closing with the Basic Laws of 1906. These were, and remain, 'popular scientific essays' intended for the layman and mostly firstpublished in thatmost popular of legal journals, Chelovek i zakon. For laymen they may have been intended, but they also are an admirable primer for the specialist. The second 'cycle' consists of chapters intended for a new textbook on Russian legal history under the editorship of Professor Kodan, scheduled for publication in 2007. These concentrate upon the period for which Omel'chenko ismost celebrated ? the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The firstis devoted to the 'Development of the State Law System ofRussia in the Seventeenth Century', and the second to the 'State-Law System of Rus sia in theEighteenth Century'. The third 'cycle' comprises articles originally prepared for encyclopedias, one ofwhich was a casualty of the disappearance of the Soviet Union (and therefore the articles are first published here) and the other ofwhich has been widely published under various names. The fourth and final cycle comprises two essays. The firstexplores the historical tradition of legal regulation in 190 SEER, 87, I, JANUARY 2OO9 Russia through the prism of theLaw and thePress. The second addresses the same general subject by examining the issue of pornography: a problem of law ormorality? This is a first-class cohesive collection. Omel'chenko writes with grace and clarity, and he has assembled materials that franklywould have been over looked even by a Russian audience because they are so widely dispersed. Given his general propensity for specialized monographs, most colleagues would have remained unaware of this considerable dimension to his academ ic output. That he has taken the care to dress his work in a book design of taste and beauty makes itall themore sympathetic. Dickinson School ofLaw W. E. Butler PennsylvaniaStateUniversity Crate, Susan A. Cows, Kin, and Globalization: An Ethnography of Sustainability. Globalization and the Environment, 4. AltaMira Press, Lanham, MD and New York, 2006. xxvii + 355 pp.Maps. Illustrations. Figures. Tables. Glossary. Bibliography. Index. $29.95: ?19.99 (paperback). Susan Crate's studyof theViliui Sakha (located in the southwest of the Sakha Republic of the Russian Federation) joins a rapidly growing collection of impressive ethnographies that do much to reverse the stereotypes of isolation and exotic otherness so often associated with Siberia. Based on nearly fifteen years of familiaritywith and fieldwork among the 'highest latitude agropasto ralists in the world' (p. 3) ? including surveys, focus groups, participant observation and extensive interviewing ? the book describes a resilient set of cultural and agricultural practices that have once again been put to the test in the turbulence of the post-Soviet period. Viliui Sakha...