Reforming the Cold War State: Economic Thought, Internationalization, and the Politics of Soviet Reform, 1955-1985

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Reforming the Cold War State: Economic Thought, Internationalization, and the Politics of Soviet Reform, 1955-1985 University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2017 Reforming The Cold War State: Economic Thought, Internationalization, And The Politics Of Soviet Reform, 1955-1985. Yakov Feygin Feygin University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Economic History Commons, and the European History Commons Recommended Citation Feygin, Yakov Feygin, "Reforming The Cold War State: Economic Thought, Internationalization, And The Politics Of Soviet Reform, 1955-1985." (2017). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 2277. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2277 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2277 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Reforming The Cold War State: Economic Thought, Internationalization, And The Politics Of Soviet Reform, 1955-1985. Abstract This dissertation explains how, as the USSR’s narrative of the Cold War shifted from the military-industrial competition envisioned by Stalin to Khrushchev’s “peaceful socioeconomic competition of the two systems,” economics began to tackle the challenge of transforming the Soviet economy from one focused on mobilization and production to one that could deliver well-being and abundance. Soviet economics changed from a field that only justified the state’s actions to a “science” whose practitioners could use their “expertise” to propose and critique domestic government policy. This opening allowed Soviet theorists to engage with the emerging issues of global economic interdependence and post- industrialism, which also challenged the post-war economic consensus in the West in the 1970s and the 1980s. Economists and scientists from East, West, and South created a transnational community gathered around institutions such as the United Nations, the Club of Rome, and the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) to adapt the institutions of the postwar state to the conditions of nascent globalization. By documenting these engagements, I challenge the prevailing historiographical narrative that so-called Soviet “liberals” “learned from the West” and instead show that reform-minded economists became equal partners in trans-European intellectual communities that hoped to reconcile the institutions of national economic planning to the conditions of globalization. I argue that to understand the politics of the post-Stalin USSR, one must understand the “Cold War Paradigm” in Soviet economic thought and policy making and how it allowed for the consolidation of a conservative hegemony under Brezhnev. Further, I suggest that despite fraying between 1985 and 1993, the conservative direction in economic thought continues to structure contemporary Russian and Post-Soviet politics. This work is based on primary research in the State Archive of the Russian Federation, the Archive of the Russian Academy of Science, the Russian State Archive of the Economy, the Russian State Archive of Contemporary History, the Central Archive of the City of Moscow, the Lyndon Johnson Presidential Library, the Rockefeller Archive Center and the MIT Institute Archives and the Harvard University Archives. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group History First Advisor Benjamin Nathans Keywords Cold War, Economic Reform, Economic Thought, History of Development, Political Economy, Soviet Union Subject Categories Economic History | European History | History This dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2277 REFORMING THE COLD WAR STATE: ECONOMIC THOUGHT, INTERNATIONALIZATION, AND THE POLITICS OF SOVIET REFORM, 1955- 1985. Yakov Feygin A DISSERTATION in History Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2017 Supervisor of Dissertation _____________________________ Benjamin Nathans, Ronald S. Lauder Endowed Term Associate Professor of History Graduate Group Chairperson _______________________________ Peter Holquist, Associate Professsor of History Dissertation Committee Benjamin Nathans, Roland S. Lauder Endowed Term Associate Professor of History Peter Holquist, Associate Professor of History Vanessa Ogle, Julie and Martin Franklin Assistant Professor of History REFORMING THE COLD WAR STATE: ECONOMIC THOUGHT, INTERNATIONALIZATION, AND THE POLITICS OF SOVIET REFORM, 1955- 1985. COPYRIGHT 2017 Yakov Feygin This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/ iii To My Grandfather and My Parents iv Acknowledgements This dissertation would not be possible without the help of many people and organizations. First, I had the input and advice of a spectacular dissertation committee. Prof. Vanessa Ogle was not only a reader of my dissertation but also taught me how to work in the “business” of academia and how to build up my portfolio as a scholar. Prof. Peter Holquist exposed me to the rich historiography of Imperial Russia helping a student who once referred to the period before 1945 as “the old stuff” understand the importance of a long view of history. Finally, I do not have enough words to express my thanks to my dissertation advisor and committee chair, Prof. Benjamin Nathans. Prof. Nathans was not only a meticulously close reader of my work. He was and remains a true teacher. His courses and advising did not so much teach me about historiography or research methods— they taught me how to think and write. Hopefully, this project can live up to the high example he set for me. As well, there are many faculty members who I must thank that supported me throughout my career. As an undergraduate, Lorenz Luthi of McGill University took me under his wing exposing me not only to the history of international relations and the USSR but convinced me that history is a discipline worth investing in. John Varty and George Grantham spurred my interest in the history of political economy. During my academic year at Oxford, I was mentored by David Priestland who put in more time and effort into me than any supervisor of an academic year long master’s degree should have. I am also grateful to Profs. Patricia Clavin and Jane Caplan who trained me in European history, making me understand how economic and international history intersected. As a graduate student at Penn, I had the support of Walter Licht and Daniel Raff who not only exposed v me to business and labor history but also to the wonderful community around the Penn Economic History Forum. I owe my training in institutional and monetary economics to Prof. Perry Mehrling of Barnard College. Prof. Mehrling acted almost as another committee member discussing my ideas at length and working with me in designing material for his course on the economics of money and banking. The community of graduate students and young scholars that he and Jay Pocklington built at the Institute for New Economic Thinking nurtured me in moments when I often felt alone working in the intersection of seemingly very unrelated topics. I also extend my thanks to Profs. Adam Tooze and Małgorzata Mazurek of Columbia University and Johanna Bockman of George Mason University, and James Mark of Exeter University for their input and collaboration. I gained valuable experience and input from Bruce Caldwell and other members of the History of Political Economy team at Duke University. My friends and colleagues at Penn and other universities have been instrumental in keeping me sane through the process of writing this project. I especially want to thank Artemy Kalinovsky and Kristy Ironside who acted like my academic older siblings and enriched me their friendship, advise, and strange shared interest in Soviet economic and monetary policy. I also want to thank Jeremy Friedman, Chris Miller, Timothy Nunan, Alessandro Iandolo, Beth Kerely, Octavie Bellavance, Deirdre Ruscitti Harshmaneand, Allisa Klots, Valdimir Ryzhkovsky, Vycheslav Nekrasov and Yuval Weber for their friendship and input. I am sure I am missing people here. My colleagues at Penn have formed and invaluable support group. I especially want to thank my fellow Russianists and honorary Russianists, Alex Hazanov, Sam Casper, Sam Hirst, Iuliia Skubytska, Claire Pogue-Kaiser, Courtney Ring, Tom Coldwell, and Kelsey Norris. Thank you also to my vi close friends Kelsey Rice, Jim Ryan, Holly Stephens, Mia Schatz, Valdimir Pavlov, Salar Mohadesi, Anthony Prachter, Janine Knedlik, Collin McGrath, Emma Teitelman, and John Lee. Other friends from Philadelphia I need to thank are Alden Young, Debjani Bhattacharyya, Katherine Epsteine, Nick Lambert, and Nick Kapur. Richard Vague and Sherle Schwenninger of the Private Debt Project have also been my dedicated supporters and mentors in working outside academia. Finally, I need to thank my support group of friends from all points in my life. Roland Rivera-Santiago, Kevin Smith, Nader Zeid, Keith Steward, Arthur Nahas, Mahmud Naqi, Ira Banks, Laila Matar, Joe Jordan, Chris Bialis, Leksa Nall, Haisheng Yang, Stephanie Dorenbosch, Lea Gottelieb, Logan and Betsy, Ian Magill, Yohanna Lucia—you all know how important you are. I also could not do this without my many training partners and coaches who gave me more bruises than I will ever have degrees. Like all history dissertations, this
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