2022 Recipient

The Ed A Hewett Book Prize, established in 1994 and sponsored by the University of Michigan Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies, is awarded annually for an outstanding monograph on the political economy of Russia, Eurasia and/or Eastern Europe, published in the previous year.

Co-Winner: Margarita M. Balmaceda
Title: Russian Energy Chains: The Remaking of Technopolitics from Siberia to Ukraine to the European Union (Columbia University Press)

Margarita Balmaceda’s book, Russian Energy Chains, provides an innovative study of energy politics. Writing in a much-studied area, she offers critical new insights into how energy politics is not just about state actors, not just about oil, and not just about supply and demand. Rather, she considers the variety of actors, incentives, and technical characteristics that affects the power of energy. She challenges the view that Russia used its role as one of the largest energy producers as a political weapon against energy-dependent and thus allegedly weaker consumers, especially countries in the former Soviet bloc and the EU as a whole. Drawing on a rich set of case studies, she instead encourages us to examine how multiple actors engage in negotiations of power along these resources’ value chain, from producers, mediators in various locations used for energy transit, and consumers. The analysis draws on insights from political science, international relations, anthropology, and cultural studies. In short, the extensive research, the nuanced analysis, and the interdisciplinary approach make this book worthy of the Hewett Book Prize.

Co-Winner: Bryn Rosenfeld