It turns out the distinguishing characteristic of Starmer the politician is not his incuriosity, his poor decision-making or his tendency to throw others under the bus but his overweening sense of entitlement ("his landslide majority").
My review of Marc's book. The only nuanced media-insider account you're likely to read straddling the Ukraine-Russia divide. A book born from anger, but which overcomes that and provides surprise after surprise where so often his colleagues pander to prejudice. postsocialism.org/2026/05/19/r...
How flexible is Russian authoritarianism?
This question is asked by Anna Schwenck’s recent book and is more relevant now than ever as the economic decline in most parts of the Russian economy accelerates
New blog post. Link in next post.
Nice of Greg to review me in the latest LRB:
Re-up: how wiling are young people in Russia to mould themselves to the demands of both the market and the government. sidenote: this case study just came out that supports both my and Schwenck's approaches.
Russian economy and society have been reorganized around war. There are now powerful domestic incentives that make ending the war difficult and even dangerous for Russia’s president.
Jeremy Morris @jeremymorris.bsky.social and myself in Foreign Affairs (open access)
It's rare when I write such a neat post that it's still true and worth reading 4 years later.
Or maybe we're all just still incapable of accepting the need for a shift away from using numbers without context? postsocialism.org/2026/06/08/f...
Great essay by @seva.bsky.social and @jeremymorris.bsky.social about why it will be hard for Putin to end the war without throwing Russia into chaos.
Why is Russia a rich country full of poor people and why do social scientists and politicians alike conspire to hide this? postsocialism.org/2026/05/11/r...
Marc Bennetts’ new book pretty much hits the spot for anyone who wants a comprehensive and accessible journalistic treatment of ‘how we lost Russia’.
Or is it class war all the way down? This question is asked by Anna Schwenck’s recent book, but it is more relevant now than ever as the economic decline in most parts of the Russian economy accele…
The quote is from my book, but I wanted to write a bit more here about inequality in Russia because it is often underplayed and misunderstood. Scroll to the end if you just want the ‘news’ about th…
Russian economy and society have been reorganized around war. There are now powerful domestic incentives that make ending the war difficult and even dangerous for Russia’s president.
Jeremy Morris @jeremymorris.bsky.social and myself in Foreign Affairs (open access)
Issue 48.10 is now online, featuring:
Stefan Collini on the crisis in universities
Lili Owen Rowlands on Agnès Varda
Greg Afinogenov on Russian ideologies
Rahmane Idrissa on the Sahara
and @jamesmeek.bsky.social on Andy Burnham.
Read online at www.lrb.co.uk
Or is it class war all the way down? This question is asked by Anna Schwenck’s recent book, but it is more relevant now than ever as the economic decline in most parts of the Russian economy accele…
