Subversive Institutions

I liked this book for the way Bunce is using Boolean algebra: a simple method but not widely used in Comparative Politics.

The book is really something. Why? Primarily for two reasons. First of all, there have been libraries of material written on the subject of the Socialist collapse, so the readers - new to the field as well as proficient scholars trying to find a good account of it within the boundaries of a book - find themselves somewhat lost in the jungle of different and presumably equally good accounts of the causes of the Socialist collapse. No more search for them now that we have the Bunce book. It covers the event concisely and to the point. The second reason is that it offers a unique and compelling explanation of the communist collapse as embedded in the system's design itself. That, of course, leaves a room for a debate whether the collapse was somewhat predetermined at the neginning, or it could have possibly been avoided. But if research can produce a debate, it is already potentially good, and hardly any book can conclusively identify all the causes of the collapse. This one, however, keeps the reader excited and the brain stimulating.

Among the multitude of books written on the issue of the Post-Socialist collapse, Subversive Institutions is a true masterpiece. It is very readable, and it can serve as a good introduction for a novice in the field, and as an excellent summary to an advanced scholar. Socialism did not collapse uniformly across the region. Bunce poses and answers three main questions: the nature of the collapse, the time of the collapse, and the reason for the collapse os state socialism. Why do some countries submerge into civil wars, while some disintegrated peacefully? To provide an answer to these and other questions, Bunce looks at the differences within the institutional arrangements, the institutional designs these countries developed during tne course state socialism. Undoubtedly, the book is one of the best ever written in the field of transitology.