The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners Left Russia Out in the Cold [Paperback]

Fiona Hill (Author), Clifford Gaddy (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 4, 2003

This is a provocative look at a problem that has been overlooked since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Using economic statistics, economic geography, and history, the book argues that what traditionally has been perceived as one of Russia's major strengths - its enormous size - is in fact its greatest weakness. The authors describe how years of forcing people and economic activity out into the vast, resource-rich, but inhospitably cold, territory of Siberia has burdened Russia with huge problems and costs. Defying nature as well as the market, the Bolsheviks forcibly industrialized the gigantic landmass they inherited from the Tsars in 1917. They deployed slave labour to build factories and cities and operate industries in some of the most forbidding places on the planet. They then used costly incentives to attract new workers when the prison camps closed. Today, people and factories languish in places communist planners put them - not where market forces would have attracted them. The book explains why this problem was not rectified in the 1990s and why it is likely to persist. Russian leaders still see Russia's future prosperity as intimately linked to Siberia and its resources. They focus on Siberian redevelopment rather than resettlement to the warmer, western regions of the country. The authors conclude by considering ways in which Russian leaders should rethink the relationship between Russia, its economy, and its territory, especially Siberia.

Editorial Reviews

From The New Yorker

Solzhenitsyn once noted that Siberia offers "plenty of room in which to correct all our idiocies." For centuries, the vast expanse east of the Urals has been a place of mythic promise and peril, its frigid terrain and unending horizons essential to Russia's sense of itself. This incisive polemic, however, argues that if Russians hope to attain prosperity they should abandon their eastern territories, where not a single settlement is economically viable. Of all the political pathologies to emerge from the Soviet experiment, none were so grandiose and manifestly disastrous as the attempt to fashion an industrial utopia in the Siberian wasteland. The policy left nearly a third of Russia's hundred and forty-five million inhabitants stranded in places where even basic survival requires a constant and costly stream of supplies. The authors make their case vigorously, but they recognize that the bureaucratic barriers to leaving remain severe, and that national myths are potent.
Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker

Review

"....[a] fascinating study." -- The Economist

"The book’s conclusion about the ominous future of Siberia casts an important new perspective on Russia’s geopolitical dilemmas." -- Zbigniew Brzezinski, Counselor and Trustee, Center for Strategic and International Studies

"This book adds important new insights into the continuing debates over Russia's economic past and future." -- Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute, Columbia University

This incisive polemic . . . argues that if Russians hope to attain prosperity they should abandon their eastern territories. -- The New Yorker

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 332 pages
• Publisher: Brookings Institution Press; First Printing edition (November 4, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0815736452
• ISBN-13: 978-0815736455
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #573,309 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Cost of Cold, January 2, 2004

By 

Stephen Neely - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners Left Russia Out in the Cold (Hardcover)

Everyone knows that Siberia is a very cold place. This book explains how the coldness of Siberia presents one of the greatest impediments to future development of the Russian economy. Under the best of circumstances, developing strategies for dealing with a large, unbearably cold place like Siberia presents tremendous challenges. The Soviets made the situation much worse by ignoring the cost of the cold. With an ample supply of forced labor provided by the GULAG prison system and a total disregard for the profitability of industrial endeavors, the Soviets put people and resources in places that made no sense economically. It is tempting to think of Siberia as a treasure chest containing vast quantities of natural resources just waiting to be exploited. Certainly the effort required to access these resources now represents an investment that will yield great rewards in the future. Hill and Gaddy expose the fallacy of this point of view using quantitative economic methods to support their detailed arguments. The cost of supporting people and factories in extremely cold places currently outweighs any benefit to the Russian economy. This book is written in a style that is both scholarly and accessible to the average reader. Not only does the book provide insight into why the Soviet economy failed, it provides clear-cut policy recommendations for economically sound ways that Russia can deal with the Siberian challenge now and in the future. According to economic considerations, Siberia is now enormously over populated and the people currently living there should be encouraged to move to warmer places. The treasures of Siberia should be kept in cold storage until technologies are developed to extract these resources profitably, without damaging the Siberian ecology.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars It's as though the US tried to re-create Cleveland in Alaska, February 29, 2004

By 

saskatoonguy (Saskatoon, Saskatchewan Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners Left Russia Out in the Cold (Paperback)

The authors' main theme is that the Soviets' determination to create cities in Siberia has created an albatross that will hold back Russian economic development forever. Most of the cities of Siberia have no economic justification for existence, and by any standard, should not have been created in the first place. Even where there are large mineral or oil deposits, the cost of maintaining huge cities in the Arctic outweighs any possible profit. Getting these people to move to warmer parts of Russia would be beneficial all round, but is difficult due to housing shortages in the more desirable parts of Russia. The authors argue that Russians need to abandon their notion that settlement of Siberia is the destiny of the Russian people and will make Russia an economic powerhouse.

If there is a flaw here, it is that the authors keep hammering away at their main point, creating a repetitive tone toward the end of the book. Throughout the book there are short articles from various periodicals in gray boxes, which serve to illustrate the authors' theoretical arguments.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If you only read three books about Russia, this has to be one., January 17, 2006

By 

Walter J. Moore "Author, The Titov Letters" (Inverness, FL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners Left Russia Out in the Cold (Paperback)

- - Most Westerners with an interest in Russia know their dilemma is palpable. This country with the largest land mass has great natural resources in oil, gas, gold, nickel, diamonds, forest products, and on and on. The Russians I know are generous to acquaintances, have strong family ties and love their country. Contrast this with across the board pay far less than much of the worlds employed with similar skills and education. Compared with the West, tuberculosis and HIV Aids are close to epidemic.

- - In a readable and systematic critique, Hill and Gaddy carefully describe Russia's geography and the overpopulation crisis in Asiatic Russia, the coldest of the world's locations. The 39 million Russians living east of the Urals are a tremendous net financial drain on the Russian economy. With clarity, the authors arrive at the solution of relocating over half of this population to warmer, western parts of Russia.

- - The authors also present the enormous problems with such a solution. Russia's leadership barely recognizes the problem and continues to urge population development in Siberia and the Far East of Russia. Moscow is Europe's largest city and the Moscow region is the most prosperous in Russia, but local politicians successfully resist all immigration. All other places in western Russia combined do not have possible employment for even a small fraction of the people the book would relocate.

- - The Siberian Curse has good argument examples included and laid out so they do not detract from the main text. Any reader should also be aware that the Notes provide much additional understanding.

- - Of the many books on Russia I have read in the past six years, only one other provides so much valuable information for the time invested. That is Anne Applebaum's - GULAG: a history - , Doubleday, 2003. When you are ready to understand more about Russia, read these two books.