Russia and China have experienced turbulent change in the last decade. Each in different ways has confronted the twin requirements of economic modernisation and democratisation while attempting to determine its place in the international system of the 1990s.

International institutions have been closely affected by and in some cases have sought to influence, these developments. Central to policy shifts in both Russia and China, for example, has been a search for a secure base of support from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Moscow and Beijing have been central players in the United Nations' responses to the conflicts in southern Africa, the Middle East and the former Yugoslavia.

Professor Boardman's book sets these events in their historical, economic and political contexts. It is based on extensive research in UN agencies, and interviews in Russia, Ukraine and China. Post-Socialist World Orders constitutes a lively and timely contribution to debates on the course of Western relations with Russia and China, and on the future of the UN system.