Reconstructing Lenin
Reconstructing Lenin

Author: Tamás Krausz

Publisher: NYU Press

Published: 2015-02-27

Total Pages: 564

ISBN-13: 1583674616

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Vladimir Ilyich Lenin is among the most enigmatic and influential figures of the twentieth century. While his life and work are crucial to any understanding of modern history and the socialist movement, generations of writers on the left and the right have seen fit to embalm him endlessly with superficial analysis or dreary dogma. Now, after the fall of the Soviet Union and “actually-existing” socialism, it is possible to consider Lenin afresh, with sober senses trained on his historical context and how it shaped his theoretical and political contributions. Reconstructing Lenin, four decades in the making and now available in English for the first time, is an attempt to do just that. Tamás Krausz, an esteemed Hungarian scholar writing in the tradition of György Lukács, Ferenc Tokei, and István Mészáros, makes a major contribution to a growing field of contemporary Lenin studies. This rich and penetrating account reveals Lenin busy at the work of revolution, his thought shaped by immediate political events but never straying far from a coherent theoretical perspective. Krausz balances detailed descriptions of Lenin’s time and place with lucid explications of his intellectual development, covering a range of topics like war and revolution, dictatorship and democracy, socialism and utopianism.Reconstructing Lenin will change the way you look at a man and a movement; it will also introduce the English-speaking world to a profound radical scholar.

Reconstructing the House of Culture
Reconstructing the House of Culture

Author: Brian Donahoe

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 2011-11-01

Total Pages: 350

ISBN-13: 0857452762

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Notions of culture, rituals and their meanings, the workings of ideology in everyday life, public representations of tradition and ethnicity, and the social consequences of economic transition— these are critical issues in the social anthropology of Russia and other postsocialist countries. Engaged in the negotiation of all these is the House of Culture, which was the key institution for cultural activities and implementation of state cultural policies in all socialist states. The House of Culture was officially responsible for cultural enlightenment, moral edification, and personal cultivation—in short, for implementing the socialist state’s program of “bringing culture to the masses.” Surprisingly, little is known about its past and present condition. This collection of ethnographically rich accounts examines the social significance and everyday performance of Houses of Culture and how they have changed in recent decades. In the years immediately following the end of the Soviet Union, they underwent a deep economic and symbolic crisis, and many closed. Recently, however, there have been signs of a revitalization of the Houses of Culture and a re-orientation of their missions and programs. The contributions to this volume investigate the changing functions and meanings of these vital institutions for the communities that they serve.

Perestroika and the Party
Perestroika and the Party

Author: Francesco Di Palma

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 2019-08-01

Total Pages: 348

ISBN-13: 1789200210

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Countless studies have assessed the dramatic reforms of Mikhail Gorbachev, but their analysis of the impact on European communism has focused overwhelmingly on the Soviet Union and Eastern bloc nations. This ambitious collection takes a much broader view, reconstructing and evaluating the historical trajectories of glasnost and perestroika on both sides of the Iron Curtain. Moving beyond domestic politics and foreign relations narrowly defined, the research gathered here constitutes a transnational survey of these reforms’ collective impact, showing how they were variably received and implemented, and how they shaped the prospects for “proletarian internationalism” in diverse political contexts.

Reconstructing the State
Reconstructing the State

Author: Gerald Easter

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2000-01-13

Total Pages: 238

ISBN-13: 0521660858

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Using archival sources, this book presents an explanation for the rise and subsequent collapse of the Soviet state.

The Gorbachev Phenomenon
The Gorbachev Phenomenon

Author: Moshe Lewin

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 1991-04-16

Total Pages: 226

ISBN-13: 0520074297

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The "Gorbachev phenomenon" is seen as the product of complex developments during the last seventy years—developments that changed the Soviet Union from a primarily agrarian society into an urban, industrial one. Here, for the first time, a noted authority on Soviet society identifies the crucial historical events and social forces that explain Glasnost and political and economic life in the Soviet Union today.

The Collapse of the Soviet Military
The Collapse of the Soviet Military

Author: William E. Odom

Publisher:

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 523

ISBN-13: 9780300074697

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In this book, a distinguished United States Army officer and scholar traces the rise and fall of the Soviet military, arguing that it had a far greater impact on Soviet politics and economic development than was perceived in the West. Drawing on interviews with key actors in the Soviet Union before, during, and after its collapse in 1991, General William E. Odom tells a riveting and important story.