New Russians

“Pulitzer Prize winner Hendrick Smith’s new book is an extraordinary achievement, an eye-opening, unique inside portrait of Russia and the Russian people today. Fourteen years ago, Smith’s best-selling book The Russians established him as America’s premier popular authority on the contemporary Soviet Union. His second best-seller, The Power Game, showed millions of readers how Washington, D.C., really works. Now, Smith returns to Russia, the country he knows so well, to show us people in the throes of revolutionary change. Based on hundreds of interviews conducted from 1988 to 1990, during nine trips that covered forty thousand miles, The New Russians tells the story of the second Russian Revolution. Here is grass-roots reporting that takes us inside Gorbachev’s U.S.S.R., by a correspondent who speaks Russian and who brings us face-to-face with the new Russians–in their homes, at work, and in school. Smith exposes the roots of reform, ideas that were germinating within the U.S.S.R during the late seventies and early eighties, but were hidden from view. He shows how they came together under the leadership of Mikhail Gorbachev, and how Gorbachev rose through the system, gathering allies, and ideas from people like the ones you will meet in this book. Smith explains how a ‘culture of envy’ operates within the Soviet system, stalling economic reform. He introduces us to farmers struggling against the Communist tradition; journalists fighting Party controls; industrialists feuding with the bureaucracy; new entrepreneurs trying out capitalism; Party leaders maneuvering to hang on to power. Smith reveals the toll taken by decades of political stagnation and deceit; explores explosive nationalist tensions in Lithuania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Central Asia, and Russia itself; discusses Boris Yeltsin and the new democrats of Soviet politics. He gives an incisive analysis of Gorbachev and of what changes will last with or without Gorbachev. And he examines what all this means for the rest of the world. Brilliantly illuminating, fascinating in its blend of personal reporting, historical and contemporary information, and fresh insights, The New Russians gives us the perspective we need to understand the sweeping tumult of change in a country so vitally important to us all.” — Dust jacket