Collision and Collusion: The Strange Case of Western Aid to Eastern Europe [Paperback]

Prof. Janine R. Wedel (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0312238282 | ISBN-13: 978-0312238285 | Publication Date: January 13, 2001 | Edition: Updated

When the Soviet Union’s communist empire collapsed in 1989, a mood of euphoria took hold in the West and in Eastern Europe. The West had won the ultimate victory--it had driven a silver stake through the heart of communism. Its next planned step was to help the nations of Eastern Europe to reconstruct themselves as democratic, free-market states, and full partners in the First World Order. But that, as Janine Wedel reveals in this gripping volume, was before Western governments set their poorly conceived programs in motion. Collision and Collusion tells the bizarre and sometimes scandalous story of Western governments’ attempts to aid the former Soviet block. He shows how by mid-decade, Western aid policies had often backfired, effectively discouraging market reforms and exasperating electorates who, remarkably, had voted back in the previously despised communists. Collision and Collusion is the first book to explain where the Western dollars intended to aid Eastern Europe went, and why they did so little to help. Taking a hard look at the bureaucrats, politicians, and consultants who worked to set up Western economic and political systems in Eastern Europe, the book details the extraordinary costs of institutional ignorance, cultural misunderstanding, and unrealistic expectations.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Impressive and informative . . ."-- Foreign Affairs

"Wedel . . . is good at conjuring up the sense of adventure and psychological complexity that ensued . . ."-- The Wall Street Journal

About the Author

Janine R. Wedel is an associate research professor and a research fellow at the Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Affairs at George Washington University.

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan; Updated edition (January 13, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312238282
• ISBN-13: 978-0312238285
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #907,430 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very well written, accurate and revealing., June 26, 2004

By 

BP - "Afficionado" (Greenbrae, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Collision and Collusion: The Strange Case of Western Aid to Eastern Europe (Paperback)

I have worked in the former USSR part time for 4 years now, and spent a lot of time there. I have become intimately familiar with what has transpired and the situation.

I have read a great deal, Russian history and much scholarly work on USSR and post. Frankly, the latter is almost 100% scholarly dreck, suitable for enriching lawns.

Nobody else has captured the essence of what has happened in the aftermath of the breakup of the USSR as well. I could add to it, for instance, the social difficulty of suddenly inverting the Marxist value system is a huge problem. Russia is trying to walk through the looking glass.

Other authors should build on Janine's work. Basically, she documents an outrage of foriegn policy and the horrible idiocy of (mostly) well meaning intellectuals and academics.

Read this book thoroughly. If you do, it will change your mind.

I watch and seethe as the same game continues today. Five star hotels get built which house the "5-Star" aid class of contractors sometimes sincerely trying to help, far too often coldly pretending with utter cynicism, and much too frequently collaborating with local people to rip off millions.

What Janine does not discuss, and should be written about by those who build on this seminal work, is the way that the ripoff game works. Billions get stolen, by heads of nations, by contractors who start banks, by so many. The legal system cannot stop it because there is no structure of law that can create a venue for prosecution of people who pull this off in places where it is done in collaboration.

Janine doesn't talk about the "warlord game" by which thugs enrich themselves either. I will not name names here, though I could. I could go on, but I won't.

Bottom line - read this book. Every American should start to understand how this works. Others should follow this courageous woman. The American people should get mad and get changes made, and most of all, travel - get out there, lend a hand to people out there with business opportunities, and find out what is being done by jerks in our name.