Abstract

Victor Zaslavsky has made an outstanding contribution to the understanding of the Soviet system. The strength and originality of his analyses lay in his ability to avoid applying concepts derived from the Soviet regime's self-image as well as from the way they used to be recycled by Western “Kremlinologists,” most of whom had been excelling in echoing the official propaganda's most outlandish claims. This is why it is distressing to see Zaslavsky succumbing to the conventions of a “Sovietology” seeking its truisms by contrasting the Kremlin's apologies for its policies with everything tenured academics are expected to praise in this, the best of all possible worlds.