The Oligarchs: Wealth and Power in the New Russia
Author(s): David E. Hoffman
This is an updated edition of 'the most dramatic and comprehensive account' of the early years of Russian capitalism, by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of "The Dead Hand". "The New York Times". David Hoffman, former Moscow bureau chief for the Washington Post, exposes the hidden lives of Russia's most feared power brokers: the oligarchs. Focusing on six of these cunning and ruthless men - Alexander Smolensky, Yuri Luzhkov, Anatoly Chubais, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Boris Berezovsky, and Vladimir Gusinsky - Hoffman reveals how the oligarchs exploited the weakened Soviet state and rose to the pinnacle of Russia's new capitalism. The Oligarchs started small. Before Mikhail Gorbachev's perestroika reforms, they were stuck in the dead-end Soviet system of shortages and bread lines. But as Communism disintegrated, they found gaps in the economy and reaped their first fortunes by getting their hands on fast money. The state auctioned off its own assets, and they reached higher, grabbing the biggest oil companies, mines, and factories. They went on wild borrowing sprees, taking billions of dollars from gullible western lenders. When the ruble collapsed, the tycoons saved themselves by hiding their assets and running for cover. This is a saga of brilliant triumphs and magnificent failures, the untold story of how a rapacious, unruly capitalism was born out of the ashes of Soviet communism.
General Information
- :
- : The Perseus Books Group
- : PublicAffairs,U.S.
- : 0.599
- : 01 September 2011
- : United States
- : 01 January 2012
- : books
Other Specifications
- : David E. Hoffman
- : Paperback
- : Revised edition
- : English
- : 600
- : ill
More About The Product
"[Hoffman's] account is the most dramatic and comprehensive yet... What makes this account both devastating and entertaining is the way Hoffman has pieced it together... he has read far and wide, and operated like a probing private eye." (New York Times Book Review) "[Hoffman's] book may well be the most authoritative account we will ever get of the early days of the four true 'oligarchs'... He describes and analyzes so well the methods by which money and power were grabbed in the new Russia." (New York Review of Books) "One of the most vivid and well-researched accounts to date of this tumultuous period in recent Russian history." (Newsweek) "Hoffman makes the tale of the men's rise and fall a masterful blend of adventure and serious, informed analysis." (Foreign Affairs) "In his devastating portrait of the so-called Russian oligarchy...Hoffman's... account provides us with more than its share of instruction...Hoffman brilliantly shows how seemingly halting and insignificant acts finally culminated in changes in a whole society." (Washington Post)"
David E. Hoffman is a contributing editor at the Washington Post. He covered the White House during the presidencies of Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, and was subsequently diplomatic correspondent and Jerusalem correspondent. From 1995 to 2001, he served as Moscow bureau chief, and later as foreign editor and assistant managing editor for foreign news. He lives in Maryland.
