[act-ma] 3/22 - Power, Petroleum, and Flawed Succession: The Roots and Impact of Putin's Russia

[Ford Hall Forum]

Ford Hall Forum Free Public Lecture
Discussion Series presents

Power, Petroleum, and Flawed Succession:
The Roots and Impact of Putin¹s Russia


with
Marshall Goldman and Uri Ra¹anan

Thursday, March 22, at 6:30-8:00 pm
at the
Old South Meeting House
(directions at www.fordhallforum.org/directions.html)

-FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC-

Russia is reemerging as an international power ‹ as strong as in czarist or
Soviet times ‹ and  President Vladimir Putin shows troubling tendencies of
reverting to authoritarian and imperial habits. Russia recently overtook
Saudi Arabia as the world¹s leading producer of oil, and it has demonstrated
a clear willingness to flex this muscle on the world stage. Within its own
borders, corruption, contract killing, and media censorship have become
routine. 

Should we regard this nation as a threat to the West, or as an ally? How
does its use of energy supplies as an instrument of foreign policy affect
global markets? In a country that historically lacks a mechanism for
legitimate succession, what should we expect as Putin steps down in 2008?

Marshall Goldman, Katherine Wasserman Davis Professor of Russian Economics
at Wellesley College (Emeritus) and associate director of the Davis Center
for Russian and Eurasian Studies at Harvard University, and Uri Ra¹anan,
director of the Institute for the Study of Conflict, Ideology, and Policy
and professor of international relations at Boston University, will explore
the impact of the Kremlin¹s concentrated political power in an age of
booming oil and gas wealth.

Come join the conversation.



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The Ford Hall Forum presents this program in collaboration with the Old
South Meeting House, as part of their Partners in Public Dialogue Series.
Old South Meeting House is a non-profit museum and historic site, located on
the Freedom Trail, dedicated to sustaining the building¹s tradition as a
community-gathering place for the free exchange of ideas and to provide a
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Additional background information

Marshall I. Goldman is Kathryn Wasserman Davis Professor of Russian
Economics (Emeritus) at Wellesley College. An expert on the Russian economy
and the economics of high technology, he joined the Wellesley faculty in
1958. In 1998, the Wellesley College Alumnae Association awarded him its
first Faculty Service Award. He is also Associate Director of the Davis
Center for Russian Studies at Harvard University.

An internationally recognized authority on Russian economics, politics, and
environmental policy, Professor Goldman is known for his study and analysis
of the careers of Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin. He is the author of
over a dozen books on the former Soviet Union.  His most recent book is
titled The Piratization of Russia: Russian Reform Goes Awry (Rutledge,
2003).

A frequent visitor to the republics of the former Soviet Union, Professor
Goldman was present during the August, 1991, coup attempt. He has met with
Mikhail Gorbachev, Vladimir Putin, former President George Bush, and
President George W. Bush and continues to meet regularly with business
leaders, diplomats, and government officials at the highest levels in both
countries.

Uri Ra¹anan is the Director of the Institute for the Study of Conflict,
Ideology, and Policy; Professor of International Relations at Boston
University; and Associate of the Davis Center for Russian Studies at Harvard
University.

Professor Ra'anan taught at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at
Tufts University for more than two decades, where he was Professor of
International Politics and Director or the International Security Studies
Program. He has also taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
Columbia University, and the City University of New York.  He is that
author, co-author, editor, and co-editor of 25 books and contributor to 19
others, primarily on Soviet Affairs, his latest publications include: Flawed
Succession: Russia's Perennial Crisis (2005), Russia: A Return to
Imperialism (1995), Russian Pluralism -- Now Irreversible? (1992), State and
Nation in Multi-ethnic Societies (1991), Inside the Apparat: Perspectives on
the Soviet Union (1990), Gorbachev's USSR: A System in Crisis (1990), and
The Soviet Empire and the Challenge of National and Democratic Movements
(1990). In addition to his book-length works, he has published extensively
in both scholarly journals and general readership newspapers, including the
Slavic Review, Strategic Review, Global Affairs, Soviet Analyst, the Boston
Globe, and the Boston Herald. His current research work focuses on the
reassertion of Russian power in the post-Soviet arena.


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