The analogy with feudalism helps us understand the baffling changes that unexpectedly appeared during the transition away from communist rule.
About the Author
Charles H. Fairbanks, Jr., is senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. Since 2006, he has been living in Tbilisi, Georgia, where he is also professor of Soviet and post-Soviet systems at Ilia State University.
Although the leading authoritarian regimes are today integrated in many ways into the global system, they have not become more like the democracies; instead, they have been devising policies and…
