The Oligarchs

April 1, 2002
There seems to be little question that the handful of men who became wealthy and powerful after the demise of the Soviet Union were greedy to the point of being criminal. Matthew Brzezinski's Casino Moscow, Chystia Freeland's Sale of the Century: Russia's Wild Ride from Communism to Capitalism, and Paul Klebnikov's Godfather of the Kremlin: Boris Berezovsky and the Looting of Russia do a good job of documenting the chicanery. What shaped the character of the so-called oligarchs? How did the decaying Soviet system influence such a diverse group of men? Hoffman, former Moscow bureau chief for the Washington Post, digs into the background of the six main oligarchs e.g., Boris Berezovsky of the All Russian Automobile Alliance (AVVA), one of Vladimir Putin's main backers, and Anatoly Chubias, former chair of Gazprom and founder of NTV (Novoe Televidenie, or "New Television") identifying the events that made each of them so predatory and so influential. Several characteristics are common to each. They all lived restless lives. They began to take advantage of the decaying system by starting capitalist ventures called "co-ops." They were experts at building social capital among the powerful government leaders. And, as Hoffman claims, most significantly, each man had "an ability to change." The book is not a prescriptive work but a fine descriptive volume that illuminates current Russian politics and finance. Recommended for public and academic libraries. Harry Willems, Southeast Kansas Lib. Syst., Iola

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