JOEL M. OSTROW is Chair of the Political Science Department at Benedictine University in Lisle, Illinois. He is a tenured Associate Professor of Political Science specializing in Russian politics, democracy and democratization, nationalism and terrorism, war, political violence, global affairs, and international organizations. He is the author of Comparing Post-Soviet Legislatures (2000).
GEORGIY A. SATAROV is co-founder and President of the INDEM (Information for Democracy Foundation), a Moscow think tank. From 1991 to 1993 he served on Russian President Boris Yeltsin's President's Council, which served as an advisory board to the President, and from 1993 to 1998 he was senior Political Advisor (including duties as President's Liaison to the Russian State Duma). He heads a large project grant on the study of corruption in government (see www.anti-corr.ru) and is Co-President of the All Russian Civic Congress. He is widely published on Russian political affairs.
IRINA M. KHAKAMADA served three terms as a People's Deputy to the Russian State Duma from 1993 to 2003. In the Duma she served on the Committee on the Economy, the Budget Committee, and as a member of the Russian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. She served in numerous leadership positions in the Duma, including as Deputy Speaker from 2000 to 2003. In 1997, she served as the Director of the State Committee for the Development of Small Enterprise and as a member of the Government Committee on Economic Reform. In 1999, she headed the State Committee on Entrepreneurship. Prior to her political career, she founded several businesses and served on the Board of Directors of the RTSB, the largest Russian stock exchange.