Experts in Search for Tools and Understandings. Review of the Book by A. Yu. Sungurov “Ekspertnye soobshchestva i vlast’” [Expert Communities and Authorities]

The review deals with the analysis a monograph devoted to the formation of the institute of Russian expertise, as well as to the problems of interaction between experts and authorities in the Russian context. The work under review is based on a large amount of empirical data. The author is a professor at the Higher School of Economics, a political scientist with extensive experience in organizing expert procedures. The central problem of the book is the contradictory interaction between the expert and the authorities. The author focuses on the dynamics of the nature of the relationship between experts and authorities. The changes in the degree of demand by the Russian authorities for the opinions of political experts is underconsideration as well. It turns out that the periods when the government is open for dialogue with political scientists are adjacent to the periods when the government is completely closed. The book by A. Yu. Sungurov is an important milestone in the scientific understanding of the role and prospects of expertise in modern Russia.