On Tuesday the Russian Federation’s eighth International Aviation and Space Salon (widely known by its Russian acronym MAKS) opened to great fanfare in the city of Zhukovsky outside Moscow. Held bi-annually since 1993, the Salon has become one of the world’s most important aerospace gatherings. According to state organizers this year’s celebration, MAKS-2007, is the [...]

In yesterday’s issue of Kommersant, Sergei Minaev, a regular contributor to the newspaper’s weekly analytical supplement Власть (Vlast’), published a noteworthy piece on the propensity of Russian citizens and statesmen to measure what happens in their country by the yardstick of foreign standards. Titled, “Half a Century in Pursuit,” the article is a brief history [...]

For the last two weeks, H-Russia (a list serv/discussion board catering largely to academics and graduate students) has hosted a lively debate regarding utility of the term “backwardness” in studying and describing the history of Russia. The discussion emerged out of a previous thread devoted to foreign travelers’ accounts of Russia, many of which (like [...]