Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Figures and Tables
- List of Acronyms
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- RUSSIA IN THE 21ST CENTURY
- Introduction
- 1 After “The End of History”
- 2 Prodigal Superpower
- 3 Structural Militarization
- 4 What Could Have Been Done?
- 5 Muscovite Metamorphosis
- 6 Military-Industrial Reform
- 7 National Vulnerabilities
- 8 The Miasma of Global Engagement
- 9 Putin's Choice
- 10 Candor
- Conclusion
- Glossary
- Notes
- Selected Bibliography
- Index
Conclusion
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Figures and Tables
- List of Acronyms
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- RUSSIA IN THE 21ST CENTURY
- Introduction
- 1 After “The End of History”
- 2 Prodigal Superpower
- 3 Structural Militarization
- 4 What Could Have Been Done?
- 5 Muscovite Metamorphosis
- 6 Military-Industrial Reform
- 7 National Vulnerabilities
- 8 The Miasma of Global Engagement
- 9 Putin's Choice
- 10 Candor
- Conclusion
- Glossary
- Notes
- Selected Bibliography
- Index
Summary
It isn't easy to ferret out the truth. If nothing else, Sigmund Freud has taught us that human behavior cannot be reliably grasped using rationalist or positivist methods. The mind operates consciously and subliminally on multiple levels, possesses inconsistent motives, and employs complex rules. Perceptions are often filtered inaccurately by convictions and cultural cues, and people don't easily acknowledge error. No one therefore should be surprised that most Sovietologists failed to accurately comprehend Soviet reality. Western public cultural values like tolerance, diversity, and conflict avoidance, combined with sympathy for socialist ideals, sanitized otherwise informed perceptions of the Kremlin's economic accomplishments and military aspirations. And the complexities of soft sciences like economics compounded the problem.
Had the USSR endured for another sixty-nine years, as it well might have, the majority of Sovietologists would still be unable to accept the truth about its physical management system and structural militarization. The USSR would have continued to be characterized as a rational, centrally planned, communist superpower that after the tumultuous Stalin years was gradually liberalizing, improving its living standard, and westernizing.
Communism's Götterdämmerung and a wealth of incriminating post-Cold War evidence, however, have cracked this facade and provided the foundation for a more objective assessment. The research in this volume, informed by new evidence, demonstrates that the USSR's postwar economic performance was substantially inferior to America's. Contrary to the estimates of the CIA, the USSR's GNP and its per capita consumption growth both lagged well behind western norms.
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- Russia in the 21st CenturyThe Prodigal Superpower, pp. 131 - 136Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2004