Scholars’ Circle-Politics-in-Soviet-Union-/-Poverty-in-Mineral-Wealth-Jan. 11th, 2015

First, while many in the West decry the politics of the former Soviet Union countries as corrupt and anti-democratic, our guest Professor Henry Hale argues, that there are much better ways of understanding the processes and politics of patronal systems. Part two of a two part discussion with Professor Henry Hale author of Patronal Politics: Eurasian Regime Dynamics in Comparative Perspective. [ dur: 20 mins. ]

  • Henry E. Hale is Associate Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at The George Washington University. His books include Patronal Politics: Eurasian Regime Dynamics in Comparative Perspective, The Foundations of Ethnic Politics: Separatism of States and Nations in Eurasia and the World and Why Not Parties in Russia? Democracy, Federalism, and the State.

Then, what is the relationship between minerals such as oil, diamonds and gold and conflict, authoritarianism and poverty? This week’s scholars have spent years studying how these so-called extractive industries “mining and drilling” impact people’s lives, their governance and the environment throughout the world. How can countries so rich in mineral wealth remain mired in so much poverty? [ dur: 38mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • ​Jeffery Mantz is a Professor of Anthropology at George Mason University. His publications include From Digital Divides to Creative Destruction: the Congolese ‘blood mineral’ trade and the fashioning of digital age knowledge economies.​
  • Michael Ross is a Professor of Political Science at UCLA. ​His books include The Oil Curse: How Petroleum Wealth Shapes the Development of Nations and Timber Booms and Institutional Breakdown in Southeast Asia​.​
  • Suzana Sawyer is a Professor of Anthropology at ​ ​the University of California, Davis. Her books include Crude Chronicles: Indigenous Politics, Multinational Oil, and Neoliberalism in Ecuador and The Politics of Resource Extraction: Indigenous Peoples, Multinational Corporations and the State.

Visit our Store [ lists books written by each on this panel ]

twitter