"Next Year in Moscow"

Who's recommending?

Kellyn Brown

Why was it recommended?

The Economist describes its latest audio offering, “Next Year in Moscow,” as a “podcast about Russia’s future.” And in many ways, it is.

Host Arkady Ostrovsky travels across Europe and the Middle East to interview people who have been impacted by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine more than a year ago. He talks to Russians who are trying to effect change, many of them now living in other countries or already imprisoned in their own for opposing the war. Whether living abroad or behind bars, there is somehow still hope among many of Russia’s citizens.

But what really attracted me to this podcast, and kept me listening until the final episode, was Ostrovsky’s research and interviews explaining how the country got to this point in the first place. How former Soviet Union President Mikhail Gorbachev, the son of a poor peasant family of Russian and Ukrainian heritage, began opening up the country and helped end the Cold War. And how current Russian President Vladimir Putin has since destroyed any semblance of democracy there.

The eight-part series provides both a history lesson and an in-depth explanation of how and why Russia invaded Ukraine. And, despite the devastation wrought by Putin’s war, it provides a glimmer of hope for his country’s future.