Reinterpreting the end of the Cold War The history of the Cold War is being re-written according to the newly available sources. But first and foremost, it needs to be re-conceptualized and framed within the broader historical context that transformed the Cold War from the 1960s onwards, altered the very dynamics of bipolarism, and eventually brought it to its end. The long duration and the unexpectedly peaceful ending of the Cold War call for new viewpoints that transcend the established paradigms about its inception. Historians ought to address all those transformations in the international economy, in the networks of interdependence linking together new areas – especially in Asia – and in the ensuing cultural images that gradually narrowed the relevance of bipolarism. Thus the habitual diplomatic and security themes must be enjoined with economic, ideological, technological and cultural ones. Here a distinguished group of international history specialists discuss the complex relationship between Cold War dynamics, the globalizing of capitalism, and the demise of Soviet Communism. Their controversial and conflicting views, as well as their multidisciplinary approaches, highlight the various factors that constituted (and did not constitute) the Cold War. Thus they help to redefine the concept itself, to map its values and limitations, and to propel historical debate onto new grounds. Silvio Pons is Professor of East European History at Rome University ‘Tor Vergata’ (Rome II) and the Director of the Gramsci Foundation, Rome. He is the author of Stalin and the Inevitable War 1936–1941 (London, Frank Cass, 2002) and has edited the Italian edition of Georgi Dimitrov’s Diary (Torino, Einaudi, 2002). He is currently working on Eurocommunism and détente. Federico Romero is Professor of United States History at the University of Florence. He has published extensively on US–European relations in the twentieth century and he is preparing a general history of the Cold War. Cass Series: Cold War history Series editors: Odd Arne Westad and Michael Cox In the new history of the Cold War that has been forming since 1989, many of the established truths about the international conflict that shaped the latter half of the twentieth century have come up for revision. The present series is an attempt to make available interpretations and materials that will help further the development of this new history, and it will concentrate in particular on publishing expositions of key historical issues and critical surveys of newly available sources. 1 Reviewing the Cold War Approaches, interpretations, and theory Edited by Odd Arne Westad 2 Rethinking Theory and History in the Cold War Richard Saull 3 British and American Anticommunism before the Cold War Edited by Marrku Ruotsila 4 Europe, Cold War and Co-existence, 1953–1965 Edited by Wilfred Loth 5 The Last Decade of the Cold War From conflict escalation to conflict transformation Edited by Olav Njølstad 6 Reinterpreting the End of the Cold War Issues, interpretations, periodizations Edited by Silvio Pons and Federico Romero 7 Across the Blocs Cold War cultural and social history Edited by Rana Mitter and Patrick Major Reinterpreting the End of the Cold War Issues, interpretations, periodizations Edited by Silvio Pons and Federico Romero First published 2005 by Frank Cass 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016 This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2004. Frank Cass is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group © 2005 Silvio Pons and Federico Romero All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. The publisher makes no representation, express or implied, with regard to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and cannot accept any legal responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions that may be made. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested ISBN 0-203-00609-7 Master e-book ISBN ISBN 0–714–65600–3 (hbk) ISBN 0–714–68492–9 (pbk) Contents Notes on contributors vii Introduction 1 SILVIO PONS AND FEDERICO ROMERO PART I Long duration, globalization and the changing frame of the Cold War 11 1 The Cold War as an era of imperial rivalry 13 CHARLES S. MAIER 2 Power, politics, and the long duration of the Cold War 21 MARK KRAMER 3 On recule pour mieux sauter, or ‘What needs to be done’ (to understand the 1970s) 39 LEOPOLDO NUTI 4 The Cold War considered as a US project 52 ANDERS STEPHANSON 5 Beginnings of the end: how the Cold War crumbled 68 ODD ARNE WESTAD 6 Karol Wojtyla and the end of the Cold War 82 AGOSTINO GIOVAGNOLI vi Contents PART II The end of the Cold War and the downfall of Soviet communism 91 7 Economic information in the life and death of the Soviet command system 93 MARK HARRISON 8 Ideas and the end of the Cold War: rethinking intellectual and political change 116 ROBERT ENGLISH 9 Unwrapping an enigma: Soviet elites, Gorbachev and the end of the Cold War 137 VLADISLAV M. ZUBOK 10 1989: history is rewritten 165 JONATHAN HASLAM 11 Gorbachev and the demise of east European communism 179 MARK KRAMER 12 The end of Soviet communism: a review 201 FRANCESCO BENVENUTI AND SILVIO PONS Index 229 Notes on contributors Francesco Benvenuti is Professor of History at the University of Bologna – Ravenna Branch. A specialist in Russian and Soviet histor, he is the author of a History of Contemporary Russia, 1853–1996 (Laterza, 1999; in Italian). Robert English is Associate Professor of International Relations at the University of Southern California. He is the author of Russia and the Idea of the West: Gorbachev, Intellectuals, and the End of the Cold War (Columbia, 2000). Agostino Giovagnoli is Professor of History at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan. He is a specialist on Catholic political culture in the twentieth century. In his latest book Storia e globalizzazione (Rome, 2003) he discusses the historians’ approaches to globalization. Mark Harrison is Professor of Economics at the University of Warwick. He is currently working on the political economy of the Soviet defence industry. He has written a number of books and articles on Soviet and international economic his- tory including The Soviet Defence Industry Complex from Stalin to Khrushchev (Macmillan, 2000). Jonathan Haslam is Professor of the History of International Relations at Cambridge University. His most recent books are The Vices of Integrity: E. H. Carr, 1892–1982 (Verso, 1999) and No Virtue Like Necessity: Realist Thought in International Relations Since Machiavelli (Yale, 2002). He is writing a history of the Cold War. Mark Kramer is Director of the Harvard Cold War Studies Project at Harvard University and a senior fellow of Harvard’s Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies. His latest book, The Collapse of the Soviet Union, is due out from MIT Press in 2005. Charles S. Maier is Leverett Saltonstall Professor of History at Harvard University, where he teaches contemporary European and International History. His last book was Dissolution: The Crisis of Communism and the End of East Germany. He is currently writing an inquiry about the nature of American hegemony in comparative historical perspective: Among Empires: American Ascendancy and its Predecessors, scheduled for publication in 2005. viii Notes on contributors Leopoldo Nuti is Professor of International History at the School of Political Science, University of Roma Tre. His latest book was Gli Stati Uniti e l’apertura a sinistra (Roma: Laterza, 1999). He is currently completing a book on the history of nuclear weapons in Italy. Silvio Pons is Professor of East European History at Rome University ‘Tor Vergata’ (Rome II) and the Director of the Gramsci Foundation, Rome. He is the author of Stalin and the Inevitable War 1936–1941 (London, Frank Cass, 2002) and has edited the Italian edition of Georgi Dimitrov’s Diary (Torino, Einaudi, 2002). He is currently working on Eurocommunism and détente. Federico Romero is Professor of United States History at the University of Florence. He has published extensively on US–European relations in the twenti- eth century and he is preparing a general history of the Cold War. Anders Stephanson teaches US history at Columbia University and is also James P. Shenton Associate Professor of the Columbia Core. He is at work on an episodic book on the conceptual history of US foreign relations as well as more conventional one on the historiography of the field of diplomatic history. Odd Arne Westad is head of the Department of International History at the London School of Economics and director of the new LSE Cold War Studies Centre. He has written or edited ten books on contemporary international history, the most recent of which are Decisive Encounters: The Chinese Civil War, 1946–1950 (Stanford University Press, 2003) and, with Jussi Hanhimäki, The Cold War: A History in Documents and Eyewitness Accounts (Oxford University Press, 2003). Vladislav M. Zubok is Associate Professor at the Department of History, Temple University. He has just finished a forthcoming book The Enemy That Went Home: Explaining Soviet Behavior in the Cold War, and he is currently working on the connections between de-Stalinization and the end of the Cold War. Introduction Silvio Pons and Federico Romero In June 2000 the Fondazione Istituto Gramsci convened an international conference in Rome on the nature, duration and interpretation of the Cold War entitled ‘Forty Years of Cold War? Issues, Interpretations, Periodizations’.