Reflections on Stalinism

Download or read book Reflections on Stalinism written by J. Arch Getty and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2024-06-15 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reflections on Stalinism distills decades of historical thought and research, bringing together twelve senior scholars of Soviet history who began their careers during the Cold War to examine their views of Stalinism. They present insights into the role of personality in statecraft, the social underpinnings of dictatorship and state terrorism, historians' attachments to their subjects, historical causality, the applicability of Marxist categories to Soviet history, the relationship of Soviet history to post-Soviet Russia, and more. Essays address the transformation of a peasant country into a superpower and the causes and scale of domestic bloodshed. Reflections on Stalinism ultimately tackles an age-old question: Do powerful people make history or are they the product of it?