Jennifer Siegel's For Peace and Money documents Russia's sovereign debt negotiations with British and French bankers and government officials from the end of the nineteenth century through the early 1920s. The book focuses especially on the personal relationships and confrontations among bankers, diplomats, and government ministers in England, France, and Russia. Siegel describes the creation of “an international environment in which foreign policy and domestic society in all three countries were affected” (p. 8). Russia's foreign debt became so large that the Imperial government exercised remarkable influence over its creditors: Siegel argues, “Russia maintained its sovereignty not despite its dependence, but, in many ways, because of its dependence” (p. 10).

Siegel draws upon a wealth of primary source material, including correspondence, government publications, and state and private documents from archives in France, Great Britain, Russia, and the United States. An impressive secondary source bibliography provides additional support. Siegel's talent for storytelling broadens the book's appeal, as does her simple explanations of financial instruments and biographies of key actors. However, Siegel's contribution relative to an extensive literature on foreign finance in Russia could have been better emphasized.

The book consists of an introduction, five chapters, and an epilogue. The introduction presents a reminder of Russia's dire financial situation at the end of the nineteenth century and outlines Siegel's argument for the connections among European countries’ financial strategies, foreign policies, and domestic politics. Chapter 1 describes Russia's “French Years,” the period 1894–1903, when “the Franco-Russian relationship…dominated the financial playing field” and “the Franco-Russian alliance relationship dominated the strategic playing field” (p. 49). This chapter introduces an extensive cast of characters and provides background for the general reader; for example, Siegel explains the meaning of fixed-interest sovereign debt and returns on investments (p. 14) and narrates a brief biography of the Rothschilds (p. 17).

Chapter 2 focuses on Russia's relationship to the international financial community during the Russo-Japanese War and the subsequent 1905 Revolution. During this period, 1904–1906, Russia began to have more success courting loans from Great Britain.  The author contrasts French and British motives for loaning to Russia in this period. According to Siegel, while the French “were obligated to loan to Russia because of governmental commitments and because of the need to prop up Russian finances in support of all Russia's preexisting debts to France,” the British had no obligation to participate in the 1906 loan” but were still “desperate to do so” (p. 84).

The first two chapters highlight Siegel's narrative style, which emphasizes personalities and relationships. Scholars will turn to Siegel's work for biographical details of a substantial list of historical figures. However, especially in these first chapters, the book's reluctance to make generalizations about the institutional environment may limit its utility to many researchers. Siegel briefly generalizes about relationships in the second chapter when she notes that the period's business relationships were “founded on personal relationships, and these relationships not only crossed institutional lines, but also easily traversed national boundaries” (p. 70). However, such asides are rare within chapter bodies, which more generally consist of narrative details of debt negotiations among Russia, England, and France. Analysis is generally provided only in the introduction, epilogue, and the very beginnings and endings of chapters rather than woven throughout the narrative. Economic historians may wish that the author had treated the economic dimension of Russian sovereign debt in more depth.

The first two highly detailed chapters set the stage for the book's second half, which focuses on Russian debt in the years surrounding the First World War. Chapter 3 presents the heart of Siegel's argument that Russia's position as a debtor nation allowed the country to exercise a surprising influence on its neighbors.  According to Siegel, during the buildup to the war “Russia, without question the weakest member of the Triple Entente, arguably held the greatest power over its partners” (p. 124). Chapter 4's depiction of Russian sovereign debt during the war years is particularly dramatic. Russia's need for tremendous financial support to match its significant wartime sacrifices frames the central tension among the Allies as outlined in the chapter. Siegel vividly conveys the allies’ financial strain in supporting Russia: while Russia underestimated its needs at each request, for the British “it was vital that the Russian government be made to see that Britain was already doing all that could be done for their Russian allies” (p. 159). In the end, however, “no amount of foreign capital, infused in prodigious quantities over almost one-quarter of a century, could ultimately stave off the Bolshevik Revolution” (p. 167).

Siegel describes how the Allies came to terms with Russia's exit from the war and the Bolshevik repudiation of Imperial Russian debts in Chapter 5. Understandably, Soviet debt repudiation caused considerable panic, which the book movingly conveys.  The British and French governments supported investors for a time, but the British stopped paying for Soviet debts in 1918 (p. 177). The period 1917 to 1923 brought dashed hopes for counterrevolution and many failed attempts to negotiate an agreement with the new Soviet government for debt repayment. In the end, Siegel writes, “It was time to recognize the Soviet Government, debt repayment or not” (p. 209).

Siegel presents her major conclusions on the role of the Great War in the book's epilogue.  According to Siegel, the Great War was a crucial turning point in the nature of Russia's sovereign debt that made Russia's creditors’ interests “more substantive and explicit,” since supporting the Eastern Front was crucial to the Allied war effort (p. 214). The epilogue begins with an effective reminder that some investors continued to lobby for Russian debt repayment for decades after the October Revolution. After the Soviet Union's dissolution, negotiations to compensate French bondholders finally resumed in 1996.

For Peace and Money's telling of Russia's sovereign debt negotiations reveals Russia's role in shaping European diplomatic and financial relationships before, during, and immediately after WWI. The book will interest diplomatic historians, financial historians, and those interested in the Great War.