Selected Thesis Topics

Since 1993, students in the REECA program have written master's theses under the supervision of a faculty member. The broad range of recent thesis topics demonstrates the flexibility of the REECA program.

“Reconciling Reform with Reality: Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights in Russia”

“The Trials and Tribulations of the Soviet Timur: Historiography, Ethnogenesis, and the Scholarly Origins of Uzbekistan's National Hero”

“Nation-Making in Russia's Jewish Autonomous Region: Initial Goals, Unwitting Contributions, and Surprising Results”

“A War of Laws: The Crimean Question, Tensions, and Ukrainian-Russian Relations”

“The Political Economy of Mass Privatization in Kazakhstan”

“The Re-emergence of Ethnic-Nationalistic Concepts in Modern Russian Philosophical and Political Thought”

“Russian Experimental Jury Trials: A Preliminary Examination”

“Questions of Identity: Islam and Ethnicity in St. Petersburg and Moscow”

“Claiming Autonomy in Russian Federalism: A Study of Conflict in Russia's Main Oil and Gas Producing Region”

“Scaling the East: Orientalism in 19th-Century Russian Music”

“Growing Against the Odds: Russian Small Business Development and the Role of External Finance”