REVIEWS 373 by economic reform. The contrast is then perhaps not so much that China and the Soviet Union followed alternative paths, but that China was able to accommodate the conflicts that accompanied economic reform within the existing political system, while Russia was not. The fact that reforms in China were economically successful, while in Russia they were not, made an enormous difference to the political outcomes. That, of course, begs the other question, of why reform succeeded in China but failed in Russia. Again, I think that it is very difficultto attributethe difference in outcome to radical differencesin policy. The key differenceis surelythe prior level of development of each country,on the one hand, and its role in the globalizing capitalisteconomy, on the other. How interdependentwere the Chinese and Russian reforms?Although we might expect them to learn from each other, Marsh actually provides very little evidence that they did so. If they were to learn from each other'sexperience , the leaders of each country should regard the experience of the other as relevant to themselves and would require a thorough understanding of the experience of the other. In reality, neither condition applied. The Soviet leaders did not think that they had anything to learn from China for racist reasonsor, as Marsh more tactfullyputs it, because they thought of China as an underdeveloped country. The Chinese did not think that they had anything to learn from the Soviet Union because the Soviet Union had long ago betrayed socialism. Correspondingly,the knowledge and understandingthat the specialistsin each country had of the other was very limited and their conceptions very stereotyped,so that there was little basis on which to draw any serious lessons. The strongest evidence for interdependence that Marsh provides is in his account of the reactions of the Chinese leadership to the collapse of Communism in Central and Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, but there is no indicationthat the Chinese specialistshad the firstidea of why the Communist system collapsed and really the only lesson that they drew was to congratulatethemselves on having maintained political stability and order, even to the extent of the severe repressionafter the Tiananmen crack-down. Although I do not think that there is much here for specialists,the book is well-writtenand the evidence and argument clearly presented so that it will make a useful text for introductorycourses. Department of Sociologv SIMON CLARKE University of Wanvick Bugajski,Janusz. ColdPeace: Russia's New Imperialism. Praeger, Westport, CT, and Oxford, 2004. ix + 303 pp. Notes. Bibliography.Index. 128.99. CuRRENr Western preoccupations with the 'War on Terror' have pushed down the political agenda concerns about the residual tensions between Westernand CentralEurope on the one hand and post-CommunistRussiaon the other. Bugajski'sdetailed and well researched study presents a forceful case that the Cold War, far from being over, has resumedin a differentform. 374 SEER, 85, 2, 2007 Bugajski charts Russia's evolving strategy to regain its position on the Eurasianstage. In doing so he challengesthe assumptionsof those in the West who claim that the new Russia lacks the resources, capabilitiesand the will to dominate the Eurasian heartland, and that it poses no threat to US and European interests.Bugajskicontends that Russia has experiencedfar greater psychological and political traumasin adjustingto its reduced role than have other post-imperialpowers. It is as a consequence, Bugajskisuggests,strongly motivated to regain its former position along its Western borderlands. This recovery strategy,he demonstrates,rests primarilyon Russia's growing importanceas an energy supplierto both Centraland WesternEurope. Other leversof influence, as the take-overof energy suppliersand deliverynetworks, the exercise of diplomatic pressure, propaganda attacks, disinformation campaigns,the fomentingof ethnic tensions,particularlythroughthe exploitation of the Russian diaspora in the independent states of the former Soviet Union, and even the manipulationof criminalnetworksform part of Russia's recovery strategy. Published before Russia's widely publicized and heavy handed energy blackmailof the Ukraine in early 2006, Bugajskicataloguesthe frequentoccasions on which Russia has used such methods againstthose stateswhich have recently left the Russian orbit. By subordinatingoil and gas companies, and most particularly Russia's largest company, Gazprom, to greater central government control Putin has made this arm of Russian foreign policy more coherent and focused. Russia...
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