The transitional politics of Eurasian space is marked by a constant struggle among three sets of ideas and institutions: the first is the remarkable resilience of Soviet ideas and institutions; second, an attempt by the regimes of these states to reinvent the historical and cultural traditions of pre-Soviet periods; and third is an attempt by a section of the powerful elite to superimpose Western liberal ideas and institutions. There is a strange intertwining of these ideas and institutions. This book examines the extent to which the post-Soviet politics has departed from the Soviet one. What...