Criminals, nazis, and islamists: competition for power in former Soviet Union prisons

'Criminals, Nazis, and Islamists' provides an authoritative overview of prisoner organizations in Russia from Soviet times to the present. It shows how the Vory criminal organization, the earliest prison gang, came to dominate Russian prisons over the course of the twentieth century and establish its own unique form of internal prison governance.

Criminals, Nazis, and Islamists provides an authoritative overview of prisoner organizations in Russia from Soviet times to the present. It shows how the Vory criminal organization, the earliest prison gang, came to dominate Russian prisons over the course of the twentieth century and establish its own unique form of internal prison governance. After the fall of Soviet Union, new criminal organizations--Islamists, Neo Nazis, and others behind bars across the former Soviet Union--began challenging the Vory. The book shows what happens when they take power inside particular prisons and have to govern themselves. Not just about Russian prisons, this book also sheds light on Soviet and post-Soviet society.