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. 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

In Criminals, Nazis, and Islamists, Vera Mironova examines conflicts and cooperation between inmates in male prisons in the former Soviet Union. She begins by focusing on the earliest prisoner groups, in particular the Vory criminal organization, which began in the 1930s. The Vory were able to develop rules, norms, and unique criminal ideology to ensure their monopoly in prison internal governance. Not only did they establish control over inmates, the Vory also successfully stood up against prison authorities to make inmates life behind bars as comfortable as possible, and as a consequence ensured its own survival in power. Mironova also explains how the Vory uses different methods, from strikes to bloody riots, to put pressure on prison leadership.The fall of Soviet Union in 1990 saw an explosion of entrepreneurial criminal organizations, and the Vory started losing their grip on prisons. This book reviews how Islamists, Neo Nazis, and other major organizations behind bars across the former Soviet Union are currently challenging the Vory and what happens when they take power inside particular prisons and have to govern themselves. By focusing on the margins of Russian life, Mironova offers a unique perspective on the social transformations impacting both the USSR and the post-Soviet space from the 1930s to the Putin era.