Overview

Russia has one of the lowest rates of adult life expectancy in the world. Average life expectancy for a man in America is 74; in Russia, it is just 59. Birth rates and population levels have also plummeted. These excess levels of mortality affect all countries that formed the former Soviet bloc. Running into many millions, they raise obvious comparisons with the earlier period of forced transition under Stalin. This volume seeks to put the recent history of the transition into a longer term perspective by identifying, explaining and comparing the pattern of change in Russia in the 20th century. It offers a sharp challenge to the conventional wisdom and benign interpretations offered in the west of what has happened since 1991. Through a careful survey of the available primary and secondary sources, Mike Haynes and Rumy Husan present a complete account of Russian demographic crisis from the Revolution to the present.

Full Product Details

Author:   Michael Haynes ,  Rumy Husan
Publisher:   Pluto Press
Imprint:   Pluto Press
Dimensions:   Width: 13.50cm , Height: 2.50cm , Length: 21.50cm
Weight:   0.530kg
ISBN:  

9780745319315

ISBN 10:   0745319319
Pages:   288
Publication Date:   20 August 2003
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  College/higher education ,  Tertiary & Higher Education ,  Undergraduate
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Out of stock  
The supplier is temporarily out of stock of this item. It will be ordered for you on backorder and shipped when it becomes available.

Table of Contents

List of Tables List of Figures Preface and Acknowledgements The USSR in the Late Stalin Era The Four Great Mortality Crises in Twentieth-Century USSR-Russia Glossary and Abbreviations 1. Demography – the Social Mirror? Lies, damned lies and statistics? Murder most foul? A century of population change in Russia The mirror of society? 2. The Revolt Against Class Society 1890–1928 Mortality in Tsarist Russia The class pattern of death War and repression Revolution and the vision of the future The waning dream 3. Death and the Stalin Era 1929–53 The pressure of accumulation The total number Death and repression The determinants of the ‘normal’ death rate Wars The end of the Stalin Era 4. Policy, Inequalities and Death in the USSR 1953–85 Judicial death and repression Imperialism and war The pattern of normal death Explaining the patterns of death National variations within the USSR vi A Century of State Murder? 5. The End of Perestroika and the Transition Crisis of the 1990s Perestroika and the collapse of the USSR 1985–91 Shock therapy reforms of 1992 The Impact of Reforms: low pay, poverty and inequality Mistaken assumptions underlying the reform programme 6. ‘Normal’ deaths During the First Decade of Transition Unprecedented peacetime mortality Why so many deaths? Key factors of mortality decline 7. Yeltsin, Putin and ‘Abnormal’ Deaths 1992–2002 Collective violence and ‘intentional’ deaths Political crisis and civil unrest Death and disease in prisons Torture and state executions The war in Chechnya 8. Conclusion Class inequality and a ‘quiet violence’ A century of state murder Appendix: Basic Data on the Prison Camp System under Stalin Notes Bibliography Index

Reviews

The issue of 'mass murder' is creeping higher and higher up the agenda and, not least in connection with the mounting tide of anti-globalization, and this book is exactly on the button as far as this expanding area of controversy is concerned Professor Andrew Reeve (Warwick University)

'Vividly portrays the casual brutality characteristic of central rule from Moscow' -- Peace News 'A vivid and chilling account of some of the most terrible events of modern history' -- Noam Chomsky

'A vivid and chilling account of some of the most terrible events of modern history' -- Noam Chomsky 'Vividly portrays the casual brutality characteristic of central rule from Moscow' -- Peace News

Author Information

Mike Haynes is Professor of International Political Economy at the University of Wolverhampton. He is the co-author of A Century of State Murder? (Pluto, 2003). Rumy Husan is Senior Lecturer at the Science Policy Research Unit at the University of Sussex. He is co-author of A Century of State Murder? (Pluto, 2003).

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