Oil is a major part of the story of Russia’s democratic retreat, as it is for many other nations. None of the 23 countries whose economies are dominated by what Diamond calls ‘the exceptional curse of oil’ are democracies. From Algeria to Venezuela, he chillingly reminds us, ‘all of the oil-rich countries of the world remained under or returned to authoritarian rule after 1974 and the third wave of democratization.’ When oil revenues surge, he writes, democracy declines.