Human Rights in Russia: A Darker Side of Reform

The connection between democracy and human rights is largely unquestioned in academia and elsewhere. However, Weiler (Russian politics, U. of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) notes, human rights violations have grown in Russia and other "newly democratizing" countries. These human rights abuses have a changing face, with women and other socially disadvantaged people more likely to be victims than political activists. He examines the changing face of human rights violations as a consequence of fiscal and state restructuring as it manifests in prisons, among women and children, and in the Chechen conflict. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)