Frontier Barons or Life in the Woods

Book review: Blyakher L.E., Grigorichev K.V., Kovalevsky A.V. (2024) Life in the Void: Anthropological Essays on Social Space beyond Governmental Regulation, Moscow: Hamovniki Social Research Support Foundation, Common Place (in Russian).

Abstract

This review discusses the collective monograph “Life in the Void: Anthropological Essays on Social Space Beyond Governmental Regulation” by L.E. Blyakher, K.V. Grigorichev, and A.V. Kovalevsky. The empirical foundation of the book is the authors’ long-term expeditions to the region. As the reviewer demonstrates, the authors not only provide extensive and exotic material but also develop significant theoretical conclusions, placing the findings within an engaging context informed by the works of James Scott. The monograph presents not only ethnographic sketches but rather a society existing at the edge of the Ecumene.