Peace and Friendship: An Alternative History of the American West by Stephen Aron (review)

Abstract

Athabascan tribes— often exerted formidable influence in hindering RAC initiatives. If the 1818–1867 era was the heyday of Rus sian Alaska, it is curious why Grinev makes statements like, “The whole period from 1818 to 1825 was a difficult time for Rus sian Amer i ca” (62), and “The financial difficulties that overtook the RAC at the beginning of the 1840s forced it to reform its own management structure in the colonies for greater savings” (145). In labeling one era of the Rus sian colonies as having the greatest vigor and prosperity, one might instead choose the 1790s– 1810s Baranov period. Despite its many challenges, the Baranov era saw the Rus sian colonies succeed eco nom ically and expand into southeast Alaska, northern California, and, for a brief time, Hawaii. Perhaps the most serious interpretive prob lem is Grinev’s use of the “politarism” theory to integrate Rus sian Alaska into Rus sian and global history. Developed by Soviet ethnographer Yuri Semenov, politarism is derived from Marxist concepts where the state is the supreme owner of resources and direct producers, and society lacks a strict judiciary to protect subjects and property from a corrupt elite. Grinev sees politarism as the fundamental weakness of Rus sian Amer i ca, and the “deciding reason” for the 1867 Alaska Purchase (264). Yet, in the same paragraph, Grinev acknowledges a “complex set of the most varied reasons” such as military, economic, and po liti cal concerns factoring into the decision to sell Alaska to the U.S. The blunt, deterministic tool of politarism often runs against and obscures the wellcrafted documentation and nuanced smaller conclusions pre sent throughout the book. Despite the above interpretive prob lems, this work is an impressive achievement in understanding the fascinating origins of Amer i ca’s fortyninth state.