Lerner describes Balgat’s progress within the framework of Western industrialism. He observes change, and after meeting with the Chief describes that “a sign of the gravity of these changes was that he – of a lineage that had always been Muhtars and landowners – was no longer a farmer” (55). Lerner attributes this change to two major causes: first, upcoming elections which will incorporate Balgat into Greater Ankara, after which it will be administered under the general municipal system (a more Westernized form of government).

Lerner’s second cause is the new bus station which leaves every hour to Ankara. When he sees this, he exclaims, “The villagers were getting out of their holes at last” (51). The emphasis on transportation and connection as a form of progress echoes the definition in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence, in which major change is attributed to the railroad. John Gray would look critically at Lerner’s assumption that the same industrial / Western model of progress will work for all societies. Lerner does not take Balgat’s cultural history into consideration, which distorts the way he sees changes as “forward” or beneficial progress. This comes into play when Lerner describes the Grocer as “yearning to be comfortably rich in an interesting city” (54). He clearly places value judgment on the town by contrasting it to a more-developed and thus more interesting city, and assumes that all people strive toward Westernization.

In the dying Russians a problem surfaces that has confronted both political scientists and journalists for decades, the problem of not being able to provide a concrete answer to an interesting phenomenon. In hard sciences I feel as if there are fewer outlets/materials to pull from/smaller margin for the acceptance of pseudo answers just based on the facts and data at hand mixed with historical trends/interpretations.

I feel as if the conclusion drawn from what information was at hand was barely a quasi response to the question of why Russians are dying at alarming rates. in this case it seems like the question should be left unanswered and in a liminal space of active speculation.

Here we see a crossover of journalism and political science and I believe in this instance the intermingling was detrimental to it being a good piece of either. As a piece of political science the need to have catchy punchlines, the readiness to fill the unquestioned minds of millions of Russions, and need for memorable conclusions derailed the piece from being as judgemental, scrutinizing and thorough/scientific in its finding. Additionally as a peice of journalism, the piece fails to stay current and brings in too much background history and cultural analysis of previous time periods to be fitting in the pages of a frequent publication dealing with news.

The idea that “Russians are dying of broken hearts” is a flawed statement that is built upon subjective analysis. It seemed as if both Parsons and Eberstadt tried to uncover why there is depopulation and higher death rates in Russia, but their task was fallible from the beginning. Globally, they sought to answer their questions in very different ways, but came to the same hazy conclusions. Parsons, the anthropologist, concluded that a lack of hope is the culprit for killing so many Russian citizens. She blamed the state for the new cultural perception, but I do not agree with that. Ultimately, the state did not change structurally so the lives of the general people was not altered either. When the state was still pushing propaganda, the entire population could have been physically supporting the state, but they could have been mentally aware of the lower class status they had. Just because the guise of a healthy state was taken away should not have such an extreme effect on the population’s health. As Gessen pointed out, Parsons overlooked many variables so she could present a “rational conclusion” to a global issue. This is a manipulation of what a social science should look like.

Eberstadt, on the other hand, looked at empirical data and statistics to try to piece the puzzle together. His analysis succeeds because he did not finish his research with a conclusion. Instead, he states “that a relationship does exist” but that more research is needed for it to be a proven fact. To me, this is a perfect marriage between using scientific methodology to investigate, but also understanding that there might never be a rational conclusion when it comes to the study of humans.

To begin, I fundamentally disagree with Gessen’s idea that, “Russians are dying for a lack of hope.” She does not build on this previous claim, but mentions anecdotally that her friend described the situation as being a civil war. I fundamentally disagree with this as well. I understand the case of high Russian mortality rates as being a function of not a failed state, but a failing state. Gessen lists multiple causes of higher mortality – fatty diet, alcohol consumption, mental health issues, etc. In laying out these causes, which she does thoroughly and accurately, it becomes clear that the state, whether after conscious thought or not, deemed these issues as secondary to whatever they deemed primary (oil extraction/price management, regional dominance, or potentially just the maintenance of Putin in power). This represents a failing state which cannot meet the health/security demands of its people, which as previously mentioned, are valid. Obviously, this is not the situation of a fully failed state in which there would be no government, no administrative capacities, no nothing like a Libya or a South Sudan formerly were/may still be (I apologize for not knowing precisely).

Additionally, this is certainly not a civil war. A civil war demands war – actual fighting, actual loss of life at the hands of others through direct, intentional means, This is to say that negligence and inability, two characteristics of the modern Russian state, do not constitute malicious intent, which characterizes a civil war

After reading Masha Gessen’s “The Dying Russians,” I almost immediately was skeptical of her ultimate claim that a lack of a “greater hope” is what is ultimately behind low Russian birth rates and high Russian death rates. In fact, I find certain parts of Gessen’s argument slightly contradictory, as she addresses events that would understandably lead to or are associated with a lack of hope, per se, such as “economic shock” and alcoholism, but then quickly determines that these things have little to no relationship to Russia’s ever-increasing mortality rates. While I am by no means saying that Russia’s admiration of vodka or the collapse of the Soviet Union are solely responsible for their mortality problem, in my mind these things tie in very closely to a lack of “greater hope,” as Gessen even quotes Parsons in saying that “drinking is, for what it’s worth, an instrument of adapting to the harsh reality and sense of worthlessness that would otherwise make one want to curl up and die.” While this may very well be true – alcoholism is an unhealthy coping mechanism for people across the globe – I find it extremely hard to believe that it is completely innocent when investigating what is truly culpable for Russia’s extraordinary mortality rate. With regards to the economic shock, Gessen fails to even acknowledge the extremely consequential effects that it has on Russian life and on individual Russians themselves. In addition to things like increased poverty and unemployment, economic shocks can lead to a lack of public education and access to necessary everyday items, directly correlating with a decrease in not only physical well-being but outlook on life as well. For Gessen to almost completely reject economic shock as at least partially leading to Russia’s increased mortality rate is baffling, as her ultimate conclusion is framed in a way that has almost no quantitative data to back it up.

Furthermore, I was surprised by the complete failure to mention anything related to political corruption and politically motivated killings. While obviously not the sole culprit in Russia’s mortality problem, I find it hard to believe that in a country plagued by corruption (especially compared to the other European countries that Gessen uses as controls in her article) political killings have played absolutely no part in at least contributing to the lack of hope that, according to Gessen, sits inside of so many Russian people.

I find Masha Gessen’s claim in “The Dying Russians” that broken hearts were the cause of dying in Russia provocative but not scientific and therefore ultimately not compelling. Her story about her time in Russia which she begins the piece with is captivating. It probably does capture certain aspects of the problems that effect Russia. However, it is just anecdotal. Gessen is unable to recognize or chooses not to acknowledge the limitations of anecdotal evidence and that is ultimately the reason why her argument fails. She chooses to fit the data to reflect her initial explanation of her experience rather than be open to amending or changing her explanation entirely. This is an example of the “method-driven” political science that Shapiro talks about. Her methodology is also very flawed.  She focuses on “[ticking] off a list of culprits” instead of proving her own claim. She argues that if it’s not infectious disease, not diet, not the environment, not alcohol, not a typical cause then it must be a broken heart. Eliminating other popular explanations is never enough evidence itself to prove your claim. She needed to provide evidence for her explanation, and she does not do so, nor does she provide a framework for studying what she means by “broken hearts” (i.e. tangible indicators). Broken hearts are also less causal factors of death then correlated symptoms of the same problem. It is as much the cause of death as per capita cheese consumption is the cause of people who die by becoming tangled in their bedsheets.

In Masha Gressen’s article “The Dying Russians”, the Russian-American journalist hopes to find the cause for the high mortality rate of Russians post-downfall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Truth be told, I am no expert on Russian history nor the the government’s transition to capitalism, but even without this context, it is easy to see the pitfalls of Gressen’s conclusion. Gressen begins with a prolific description of her experience in Russia in 1993 and her aghast shock over people’s complacency over the growing death rates of their country. Transitioning from this narrative, she goes onto negate countless attempts by specialists like Michelle Parsons and Nicholas Eberstadt who have worked to answer the questions by looking at poverty rates, lack of health care, economic turmoil, diseases, diets, drinking and more. Half of her essay deals with discrediting empirical evidence of strife in the country, but only two paragraphs of her article is dedicated to “proving” her eventual, oversimplified conclusion: Russians are dying because they just lack hope! Who would have known? She doesn’t give enough historical background when she focuses in on the Gorbachev period and the Khrushcev era so her arguments about how “intensive housing construction” correlated to people being inspired to “have babies as well” seemed contrived and rushed. Moreover, she concludes that this depression has become so imbedded in Russian society that there is a possibility that Russians are now intrinsically born with hopelessness. Following this she states, “Is it also possible that other post-Soviet states, by breaking off from Moscow, have reclaimed some of their ability to hope, and this is why even Russia’s closest cultural and geographic cousins, such as Belarus and Ukraine, aren’t dying off as fast?” Strategically dramatic or not, her last few sentences work more against her than for her. Ultimately, Gressen’s rushed articles proves the importance of establishing a thesis that is driven by tenacious research than solely basing itself on paring down other’s work.