Ethnic Politics after Communism. Edited by Zoltan Barany and Robert G. Moser. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2005. 296p. $19.95.

In the wake of communism's collapse, dire predictions of intractable ethno-religious conflict throughout the post-Soviet and East Central European territories were the order of the day. Although ethnic violence overshadowed opportunities for political transformation in the Caucuses and Balkans during the 1990s, many of the potential fault lines of ethnic conflict have weathered the tumultuous period of transition either without incident or via institutionally regulated means. While it is fortunate in human terms that the latent ethnic tensions in most instances fell short of their genocidal potential, the failure of political science and sociology to predict accurately the scope of ethnic conflict resulting from the implosion of communist regimes highlights the limitations of social science, especially when the events it purports to explain are rapidly unfolding. With a firm grasp of these limitations and 15 years of hindsight, Zoltan Barany and Robert Moser, in their edited volume, reassess the impact that regime change and state collapse have had on identity and ethnicity and, in turn, how ethnicity and nationalism have shaped the transitions from real socialism.