Riding the Tiger

Leon Aron, who was born in Moscow and came to the United States as a refugee in 1978, is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). He studies Russian domestic and foreign policy, US-Russia relations, and the economic, social, and cultural aspects of Russia's post-Soviet evolution. From 2014 to 2020, Dr. Aron was a governor of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which oversees the operations of several international broadcasting outlets, including Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Dr. Aron is also a prolific writer and editor, and his books include "Roads to the Temple: Memory, Truth, Ideas, and Ideals in the Making of the Russian Revolution, 1987-1991" (Yale University Press, 2012), in which he details and analyzes the intellectual and moral revolution that precipitated the end of the Soviet Union; "Russia's Revolution: Essays 1989-2006" (AEI Press, 2007); and the first in-depth biography of Boris Yeltsin, "Yeltsin: A Revolutionary Life" (St. Martin's Press, 2000).