A review of From Reform to Revolution: The Demise of Communism in China and the Soviet Union, by Minxin Pei and Sowing the Seeds of Democracy in China: Political Reform in the Deng Xiaoping Era, by Merlec Goldman.
About the Author
Jan S. Prybyla is professor of economics at Pennsylvania State University. He is the author of Reform in China and Other Socialist Economies (1990).
Evidence from social science and history suggests that China is entering a “transition zone” that will threaten its capacity to maintain both authoritarian rule and high levels of economic growth.
Since Vladimir Putin’s rise to power at the end of the 1990s, siloviki—the people who work for, or used to work for, Russia’s “ministries of force” have spread to posts…
