Vodka Diplomacy: And Other Adventures and Lessons in the New Russia

by Phaedra Fisher

1994 - Moscow Armed with an excellent education, na�ve optimism, and raw enthusiasm, a young woman takes her first steps from studying the theory of economic reform in the former Soviet Union to the reality of attempting to shape it. From the back cover: Every generation of university graduates believes they are going to change the world. My classmates and I took things one step further and really tried. The Soviet Union had collapsed in late 1991. The future was not yet written. There were no correct answers. Anything could happen. On this raw new frontier, anyone in academia or politics or business who tried to posture as an "expert" was really just guessing as best as they could. My classmates and I who studied Russian language and economics found ourselves graduating at the precise moment in history when these skills were highly valued. I leaped into the thick of the post-Soviet era, delirious with na�ve optimism, a thirst for adventure, and a mission to make a difference. Vodka Diplomacy is my story of what happened next.

Genres: Nonfiction

416 pages, Paperback

First published November 16, 2013