
Putin and the Rise of Russia, by Michael Stuermer
For many years, Professor Michael Stuermer has been one of the West’s most respected authorities both on Russia and on Germany. As at home in English as in his native German, he has pursued not only an academic career, but has brought lustre to the usually grubby trade of journalism as chief correspondent for Die Welt. Few can be as well qualified to write about contemporary Russia, to analyse the extraordinary phenomenon of Putin or to add a late addendum on Putin’s successor, Dmitri Medvedev.
The resulting book is authoritative, readable and concise. Stuermer traces Putin’s rapid rise via Sobchak’s mayoral office in St Petersburg and Borodin’s holding company for foreign assets to Yeltsin’s ‘family’ at the Kremlin. The new Tsar emerges as a man at home with power who has a strong analytical grasp of the vast difficulties Russia must surmount in order merely to survive, let alone to achieve his primary objective: stability.
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