Academics usually publish reviews of books they disagree with, not sign open letters about them. Maybe the real problem is Altmetrics and AI changing the meaning of intellectual authority. My new blogpost - link in next post:

New (guest) blogpost on Russian polling: Total Recall? Is the firewall broken between unpopular decisions and Putin? In the popular imagination he is a figure hovering above the political fray. Is this now untenable? Link in the next post.

"Like we have to do something to make things better for our country because our country is in crisis and a disaster, a geopolitical disaster has unfolded. We didn’t get a say in it, but we have to do something." Part 2 of my interview with @euraknot.bsky.social link in next post

The four big challenges in studying Russia since 2022 Well, it's not really four, but 'access', 'self-censorship', '(un)representative data', and 'ethics' are a decent approximation. A post about some talks at BASEES 2026. postsocialism.org/2026/04/13/t...

Are you an early career research who would like to spend a semester at the Center for Digital Narrative at the University of Bergen? We have a call out now for a stipend to cover mobility expenses for 3-4 months in the first half of 2027. Apply before 15 May! skjemaker.app.uib.no/view.php?id=...

Another informative and entertaining podcast episode from @jonnytickle.bsky.social, @jeremymorris.bsky.social, and James Pearce — at least for a sicko like me who tried his hand at and quit Russia-focused academia. www.podbean.com/media/share/...

"Everyday politics is a way of really grounding the term by interacting, listening, talking to people; you tease out what the content of everyday life is, that is still political." transcript of an interview I did for the podcast The Eurasian Knot. postsocialism.org/2026/04/08/w...

Just a few days to go until our #BASEES2026 panel on the "Hidden Pillars of the Soviet Economy," featuring Tamar Qeburia on Georgian manganese, @alexoberlaender.bsky.social on the shabashniki & yours truly on good old peat. Comments by @jeremymorris.bsky.social Join us on Friday, 10 April at 4:45

"A kind of political biography that records the ebbs and flows of Russian provincial life. How have Russians responded to their government’s invasion of Ukraine?" t.co/BhZ88DRfae

My review of Oscar-winner Mr. Nobody against Putin. In my view, the film is neither about indoctrination nor ‘everyday resistance’, however much people would like it to be. Most of all it's a good portrayal of coming of age in Russia today. postsocialism.org/2026/04/01/t...

Good on France. Boo to the German authorities (denied humanitarian visa).

New blogpost: why I think D’Anieri’s updated Ukraine and Russia: From Civilized Divorce to Uncivil War is the single best book you can read to understand the domestic and geopolitical causes of the current war. postsocialism.org/2026/03/22/t...

Your average Muscovite's digital dependence and Russia's attempts at digital sovereignty more generally are up for some spicy and feisty discussion in this new video. [link in next post]

What I'm reading: Oleg Kashirskikh & Alexander V. Laskin (11 Mar 2026): Becoming Russian war migrants: between ‘Biopolitical waste’ and ‘Flexible citizens’, Globalizations, DOI: 10.1080/14747731.2026.2642483

In our podcast (out tomorrow morning), I argue they did it 'because they can', but Shulman's explanation is better. To paraphrase: "they got the ability to do it, so they had to. If they hadn't they'd look weak. Because they did, they look weak."

Good contextualization, whether you like the film or not. It comes down to the editorial treatment of the political atmosphere of schooling. I still think my book's portrayal of the average school is better, because unlike this film, I explore it from perspective of a "patriot" teacher.

Re-reading Tony Wood. Now there are 155 billionaires in Russia. And yet a scientist in the capital might only earn 1000 dollars a month (cost of living is extremely high there). Wood's argument is about "synthesis of the realms of government and business"

What I've learned from AI and the US-Israeli-Iran war is that tenured academics will do anything to avoid writing.

just following (executive) orders

We talk a lot about the economic pessimism in Russia and of course a lot of nuts and bolts of the changing urbanscapes in Moscow, St Petersburg and Penza. You can just feel my bitter-sweet sentiments as I make my last walk around the centre of Moscow.

I'm just wondering here, but, you know, maybe the presence of the 20th SS Division might have contributed to this destruction. But maybe I'm imagining it.

This is just such a great piece of analysis with photos that take you right into the heart of the action. Incredible work from @anahlcq.bsky.social and @cmluttun.bsky.social!

My article about the implications of the war for Area Studies made it into the top ten list of highest Altmetric Attention Score across all T&F journals over the last week. The article has been made free to access until 31st March. [link in next post]

The “good enough” attitude —valuing productivity for its own sake, pursuing quantity over quality, and generally having low intellectual standards — has long been a path to academic success. AI merely supercharges this. Amazing to see people so openly proud of their own mediocrity though.

It’s fantastically British that Lloyds of London is seemingly instrumental to the likely impending closure of tanker shipments out of the Gulf but that the UK closed down its only gas storage site at Rough in 2021. Two of our six remaining oil refineries also closed last year.

the week's russia unfiltered with @jeremymorris.bsky.social is very good and i still surprised that, as the oldest member--i think--it is _he_ of all people on the new microblog hotness, an the rest are nowhere to be found well, quite possibly na telege but goddamn do i hate telegram's UX

Just want to re-emphasise that despite appearances there are many Goodwins still in academia who love to punch down and love to paint themselves as victims of progress 'gone too far'. They routinely make sexist, racist and classist comments openly, because they know they can.

reupping this take on the perils of historical comparison pertaining to the war. A bit of 'it's the economy stupid', and a review of my successful - if cringe - predictions from January 2022.

A new post summing up what I got wrong and right, four years into the Russian war on Ukraine. Some musings on the problem of prediction, on main problems of not taking economic forces seriously enough, and lots more. postsocialism.org/2026/02/25/a...

Well, this review of my book in Mobilizations journal has made my day.

Shaun Walker's piece in Graun is good, actually. Hate to admit, US and UK intel was right on the money www.theguardian.com/world/ng-int...

ministerial cats. Grigorii and Filimon.

The dark mirror of Russians deciding - in less than a decade - that they hate Europe and 'we have never been European' even while values-orientations make clear they are the more European than ever. The answer: ignore the presentism of attitude polls.

Good to see Jacobin give space to this very wide-ranging Radical Democracy Network conference on Russia. (there's some quotes of me earlier in the article). Link in next post.

I signed up to the class action against Anthropic as one of my books was used for training. Now I'm imagining how they destroyed it after scanning it; the publisher did not provide author copies because we were too many editors so I have never even owned a physical copy and had to obtain the ebook.

When I suggested we should do this months ago I didn’t believe it was possible tbh. Creative resistance looks like this. Guerrilla looks like this. A revolution doesn’t need blood, it needs courage.

My review essay on "The Work That Never Ends" has been published open access in @conteurohistory.bsky.social. It reviews an edited volume on #emotions and #work, two books on #NS concepts of work and a monograpgh on a #GDR enterprise. Check it out here: www.cambridge.org/core/journal... #skystorians

bit of fieldwork

In which @tompepinsky.com suggests that #genAI may have is uses for social scientists (and social science?) after all

Interesting discussion with Harvard senior editor in *the other place*. Pitch v. patronage in academic publishing. Reminds me of my mild expose of the scam in a post two years ago: postsocialism.org/2024/05/17/t...

Speaking of which, Reviewer 2 complains my abstract doesn't align at all with my article's argument. Gonna tell him a "big AI did it and ran away".

So my interview with Die Zeit is out. Instead of a snippet of the content - here's some comments. Really not had this level of constructive engagement from readers ever before in mainstream. If anyone wants an English version, just message me.

Re-upping. If you want more reviews of Russia-Ukraine books, take a look at this post and leave a like.

Wow, never thought of that, thanks Tim

Russia's 2025 top inflationary products in "observed basket" of goods: Notarized/reissued official documents (c. +35%) Blood-pressure medicine (c. +25%) Lemons (+32%) Coffee (+26%) Vet services(+23%) social rent (+22%) physical newspapers (+20%). Other food down -15% (!)

Current reading: "A Chto Sluchilos'?: Ethnographies of Holding It Together", Tatiana Chudakova, Cassandra Hartblay, Maria Sidorkina in The Russian Review 83(1).

"a lot of what passes for scholarly work on the Russia-Ukraine conflict fails to meet scholarly standards, becoming a rehash of media sources and stuck in a kind of ‘presentist’ and elite-focussed, geopolitics doom-loop" postsocialism.org/2026/01/21/b...

My pension! We're so back.

Current reading: Kirsti Stuvøy (12 May 2025): Everyday authoritarianism in Russia: new and old stigmatisation and insecurities in monotowns, Contemporary Politics.