Preface:

The Russian Revolution marked the opening of the “short twentieth century” (1917-1991), and its demise signaled that turbulent century’s end. During its lifetime, much of the world viewed the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) as the defining political experiment, the greatest modern challenge to liberalism, capitalism, imperialism, and fascism. This course was about the Soviet Century. Topics included the emergence of the Soviet Union from the ruins of tsarist Russia, the role of ideology in state policy and everyday life, the Soviet Union as the center of world communism, the challenge of forging a new society from an ethnically diverse population, the Soviet Union’s epic defeat of Nazi Germany, its rise to the status of superpower, its various attempts to reform itself, and its sudden dissolution in 1991. We followed the rulers (from Alexander II to Nicholas II to Lenin, from Stalin to Gorbachev to Putin) as well as the ruled (peasants, workers, intellectuals; Russians, Ukrainians, Jews, Latvians, Armenians, Georgians, Azeris, and many others). The course concluded with a con-sideration of the origins and consequences of Russia’s war against Ukraine.