The Oligarchs: Wealth and Power in the New Russia [Paperback]

Having lived and worked in Russia for many years I experienced first-hand many of the changes of the 90's. However, this book provided many insights, often quite provocative into what was really happening in the 90's and many of the key players in Russia at that time. Particularly insightful are the backgrounds on the oligarchs as it helps us better understand their thinking, their drive and their ambition. Would Russian democracy have collapsed in 1996 without them? Perhaps it would have, though this is something we shall never know. Was Putin put in place by Berezovsky and then thrown to the wind as their interests diverged? Quite possible given the nature of Russian politics and the behaviour of oligarchs. What the book does demonstrate is the inextricable link between business and politics in Russia, something made very visible by colourful characters such as Berezovsky but which appears less so now with dour(relatively) characters such as Abramovich and Potanin.
Overall, a thoroughly enjoyable read and I look forward to a sequel in three to five years when the events of 2000 onwards can be evaluated with hindsight.

Hoffman as the Moscow based chief for a US newpaper and Russian speaker was ideally placed as the events covered by this book occurred. Starting from the Fall of communism and the rise of a new business power elite the like of which Russia had never seen since 1917 through Yeltsin's faltering reign due to his health, to the change to Putin is over the 500 odd pages covered with a masterful handling of an incredible range of material and evidence. Hoffman gives a great feel of what set apart both the central characters from their different origins to their rises (and in most cases falls) from power with spectacular fortunes and egos being accumulated along the way. One of the real surprises and pleasures in the story is how he does not just focus on the new business magnates but other key economists and officials such as the Mayor of Moscow in showing how a very Russian model sought to break from its past and work to avoid a resurgence of communism as a free economy was forged.

The real strength of the book is a conveying of how it actually felt in Russia at that time (the abuses and the corruption); the simple but major errors made (such as the refusal to see the rouble was heading for a dramatic devaluation) and the government's (both centrally and via different agencies and state banks) naivete in letting a small elite continually profit at the expense of the majority.

While the book is rapidly being taken over by recent events under Putin with the recent imprisonment in 2003 of Khodorovsky who was one of the few survivors by the end of this book, hopefully the writer will attempt a sequel in bringing this masterpiece fully up to date.

This book tells you about a half dozen men of various backgrounds who have one thing in common: they succeeded in using the major political disruptions in the Soviet Union and became incredibly rich and powerful in the new Russia - the so-called oligarchs.

I find this subject extremely interesting, as well as puzzling. In spite of close historic ties Russia has to my country, some things about it are still quite mysterious to me. Among other things, I'd really like to understand what that oligarch thing is all about.

Unfortunately, this book is extremely incompetent and badly written.

Let's talk about the style first. In the communist-ruled Eastern Europe, they often published propaganda stories about the supposedly miserable life in the capitalist West. Like how the unemployed John Smith drew the lapels of his holey coat tighter in the freezing New York winter and walked on, going from trash can to trash can, hoping to find some food remains.
This book reminds me of that red propaganda crap from my childhood. It's anti-red, of course, but the style is the same. The author just paints everything black, criticises everything indiscriminately, even things that have nothing to do with politics.
The last thing I want to do is to defend the communists. The Soviet Union was horrible and inhuman, which I know better than any American possibly could. But I just hate ignorant Western authors who whine about everything without really having a clue. For example, Mr. Hoffman meditates over Soviet people using the verb "to get" or "to take" when they meant "to buy", and how that is supposed to be reflecting the Soviet reality where many wares were in short supply. That is outright idiotic because expressions like "I'm gonna get myself a new bike" (in the meaning of "I'm gonna buy myself a new bike") or "I'll take it" (in the meaning of "I'll buy this") are routinely being used in English, in the democratic, capitalist USA as well.
Another striking example of Mr. Hoffman's style that any communist newspaper editor would be proud of is about the drink vending machines on the streets. Mr. Hoffman tells us sneeringly how the machine was as big as a refrigerator. Well, let me tell you that I was in the Western Germany in early 90's, and guess what? The drink vending machines there, although different, were just as large. It's simply practical that you make a machine like that approximately of a human's height, so that it's comfortable for human beings to use. But for Mr. Hoffman, the size of the machine is naturally just another manifestation of Soviet ineptitude. As if that wasn't ridiculous enough, he makes even the colour of the drink vending machines appear like a symbol of totalitarian oppression.
And so Mr. Hoffman goes on like an arrogant spoiled Western tourist, telling us how the apple juice was of poor quality and the label was ugly. That is so retarded. I don't think he has ever seen that label or tasted that apple juice. If Mr. Hoffman were British, he would probably lament how the Communist Party forced the people to drive on the right side of the road.

Apart from that silly yellow-press writing style, Mr. Hoffman has quite a wrong idea of people's sentiments in the old Soviet Union. His ignorant and stereotyped attempt of describing the ordinary people's life in Moscow in 1985 makes you think that everybody hated the communist rule and dreamed of parliamentary democracy. While that may seem plausible to an average North American or West European, it wasn't like that in reality. Yes, there was severe ethnic enmity in non-Russian parts of Soviet Union, and there was genuine anti-communist sentiment in certain border areas where people watched foreign television broadcasts, but it was amazing how people who lived just 100-200 km further away from the border (not to mention in Central Russia) had a completely different attitude. They had no truthful picture of the free world and, critical as they might have been of the shortcomings in their everyday life, they honestly believed that the West with its unemployment and mafia and lack of social guarantees would be an even worse place to be. As many people were old enough to remember the (relative) economic prosperity about 20 years earlier, the prevailing mentality (especially in Russia proper, about which Mr. Hoffman is writing) was that the present rulers were stupid. They were far from realising that the Soviet Union itself was rotten to the core. Even today, when I travel in Russia, I'm routinely asked by quite decent and intelligent people: "Why did you have to secede from the Soviet Union, we lived so happily together until that Gorbachov destroyed everything." Or at least they tell me what a pity it is that the Soviet Union is no more, and I keep my mouth shut - there's no point offending them by telling them the truth they still don't want to hear.

The way Mr. Hoffman describes the last years of the Soviet Union, he proves clearly that he is nothing more than a clueless sensation-hungry journalist. I don't think you can learn anything useful from that fool, or rely on any of his "research" to have much in common with reality.