Taxes and Trust is the first book on taxes to focus on trust and the first work of social science to concentrate on how tax policy actually gets implemented on the ground in Poland, Russia and Ukraine. It highlights the nuances of the transitional Ukraine case and explains precisely how and why that 'borderland' country differs from the more ideal-types of coercive Russia and compliance-oriented Poland. Through nine bespoke taxpayer surveys, an unprecedented bureaucratic survey and more than fifteen years of qualitative research, the book emphasizes the building and accumulation of trust to transition from a coercive tax state to a compliant one. The context of the book will appeal to students and scholars of taxation worldwide and to those who study Russia and Eastern Europe.

The first book on taxation to focus on trust, allowing readers to see how trust can be put at the centre of policy implementation

Qualitative and quantative research provide readers with innovative and recent information on key components of post-Communist governance

Compares state bureaucracies in three different countries and shows readers what the precise ingredients are for building a capable state

Marc P. Berenson, King's College London

Marc P. Berenson is a senior lecturer at King's Russia Institute, King's College London. He has undertaken consultancy work for the World Bank in Russia and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Tax and Development Programme. After receiving his B.A. from Harvard University, Massachusetts, he founded and directed the 'Law in Action' program for Freedom House in Ukraine, before receiving his Ph.D. in Political Science from Princeton University, New Jersey, in 2006.