How could Putin, before the eyes of the world, shape Russia into an imperialist dictatorship of violence in order to wage a war of aggression against Ukraine and the values of the West?
With his eye-opening analysis, Volkov shows how Russian politics has functioned since the fall of the USSR and what must happen for things to change.
The Russian opposition politician and activist Leonid Volkov is the closest confidant of the dissident Alexei Navalny, who has been imprisoned since January 2021. For more than a decade, he has been committed to democracy and the rule of law in Russia and has fought against corruption and arbitrary rule, first as a member of parliament in Yekaterinburg, later as Navalny’s campaign manager and chief of staff. He now describes first-hand what it means to fight for years against a system that pretends to be democratic on the outside but resorts to ever harsher measures on the inside.
His book is the gripping account of a contemporary witness who relentlessly exposes the brutal imperialist dynamics in post-Soviet Russia and shows what could have been recognised in the West years ago. If you really want to understand Russia, Putin and the history leading up to the invasion of Ukraine, you cannot avoid Wolkov’s explosive analysis.