Reinventing Collapse

Orlov, a Russian-American engineer who witnessed the Soviet collapse firsthand on repeated return trips through the 1990s, argues that the USSR was in several respects better prepared for its own collapse than the United States would be — because Soviet housing, transport and food distribution were already communal and state-held, and because nobody expected the system to provide.

Context: A collapse-genre book with a specific and unusual comparative claim rather than a general warning. Worth flagging that Orlov writes as a polemicist and the thesis is contested; his later work and commentary on Russian politics are more openly partisan than this book. Carded as a recommendation received, not an endorsement.

Connections

• Has Anyone Read This… (tweet) — where this was saved from.
• Dmitry Orlov — the author.