The Columbia Guide to the Cold War - Hardcover

Kort, Michael

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0231107722 ISBN 13: 9780231107723

Publisher: Columbia University Press, 1998

Synopsis

The Cold War was the longest conflict in American history, and the defining event of the second half of the twentieth century. Since its recent and abrupt cessation, we have only begun to measure the effects of the Cold War on American, Soviet, post-Soviet, and international military strategy, economics, domestic policy, and popular culture. The Columbia Guide to the Cold War is the first in a series of guides to American history and culture that will offer a wealth of interpretive information in different formats to students, scholars, and general readers alike. This reference contains narrative essays on key events and issues, and also features an A-to-Z encyclopedia, a concise chronology, and an annotated resource section listing books, articles, films, novels, web sites, and CD-ROMs on Cold War themes.

About this title

About the Author

Michael Kort is a professor of social science at Boston University's College of General Studies. He is the author of several books on the Soviet Union and Cold War history including The Handbook of the Former Soviet Union; The Soviet Colossus: History and Aftermath; and The Cold War.

Reviews

A valuable encyclopedia on the Cold Warone of the few availablecontaining a wealth of information not otherwise available in one place. Kort (Social Science/Boston Univ.; The Soviet Colossus: A History, 1984, etc.) deals in a short, 96-page introd uctory essay with the origins and development of the Cold War, including the reasons for the deterioration of relations between the US and the Soviet Union in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War; the impact on US domestic politics; why the Col d War expanded into the Third World; dtente and its decline; and what factors ultimately ended it. Most useful is the discussion of the differing interpretations of the struggle, a debate between the traditionalists, who have argued that the problem lay i n an expansionist Soviet Union; the revisionists, who blamed US economic expansionism, almost without regard to the Soviet dictatorship; and the post-revisionists, who rejected this economic determinism and the failure to take the Soviet threat into accou nt, while not neglecting the security concerns of the Soviet Union. Kort holds that recent research in the Soviet archives strengthens the traditionalist and post-revisionist views. The last three sections of the volume are a collection of short biographi es of the major participants, a concise chronology, and a 140-page critical bibliography of the subject, grouped by period and by topic, with comments on the utility of particular texts for instructional purposes. A very useful approach to the subject. - - Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

This is the first in a projected series of one-volume guides that seek to synthesize the extensive literature on a topic and organize it in a useful way for the student, scholar, or general reader. If Kort's book is the model, then this should be a successful venture. In fewer than 400 pages, Kort covers a lot of territory, beginning with a narrative survey of the Cold War which explains some of the historiographical debates that have occupied historians for more than 50 years. Following this section is a mini-encyclopedia consisting of one- or two-page essays on a wide range of Cold War topics. The book concludes with a concise chronology and a comprehensive bibliography of books, films, novels, journal articles, and archival sources. Finally, in keeping with the times, Kort points out some of the relevant current websites and CD-ROM products. An impressive debut and a worthy companion to Thomas Arms's Encyclopedia of the Cold War (LJ 10/15/94) and Thomas Parrish's The Cold War Encyclopedia (LJ 12/95); recommended for all libraries.?Ed Goedeken, Iowa State Univ. Lib., Ames
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0231107722
• ISBN 13: 9780231107723
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 420