I may have gotten a slightly lower grade than I would of liked but I would retake this class in a heart beat. Treisman is an amazing lecturer who is telling a story through all his research on Russia. He is the top of his field. Once in a while the material got dense but very managable class. TA's prep you for the midterm and final and both. I had Fernando, who did a great job.
If your a poli sci major or have any interest in Russia mainly post communism/ 1980's onward, take this class.

Treisman's lectures are very organized and engaging. (He has a habit of randomly namedropping high-level Russian officials he's talked to.) The class itself involves quite a bit of reading, but it's not too bad and the grading for the essays ends up being pretty generous. Fun class overall and I'd highly recommend it to anyone interested in international politics.

Absolutely great teacher. Before taking the class I had no idea on the complexities of Post-Communist Russia. He does a great job of providing enlightening information that really gets to the core of how Russia looks and acts. I didn't do any of the reading except for my two papers that are take home, and I got a B+ on the midterm, still working on the final. The TA I had, Raul, was excellent and I hear the other one is very good too. Talk to your TAs about the papers and do the reading tied to the papers and go to class and you'll have no reason to walk away with less than a B in the class, and it just takes some small effort to move from a B to an A in the class.