Stalin in Power: The Revolution from Above, 1928-1941 - Hardcover

Tucker, Robert C.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 039302881X ISBN 13: 9780393028812

Publisher: W W Norton & Co Inc, 1990

Synopsis

Recounts Stalin's establishment of state-run collectives, discusses the political reasons behind his pact with Hitler, and analyzes the effects of Stalin's reign

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Reviews

Many Western historians portray Stalin as a pragmatic, if disastrously blundering revolutionary who had no overarching vision of where Russia was heading under his leadership. Not so, argues Tucker in this massive, provocative history; Stalin acted with forethought. Driven by a need to prove himself "a second and greater Lenin," he boldly and confidently implemented his collectivist schemes, backed by a policy of terror and accomplished through the seizure of peasant lands and households, mass murder, forced resettlement and prison camps. His state-directed, state-enforced "revolution from above," in Tucker's ( Stalin as Revolutionary ) view, was a throwback to the state-building of the earliest Muscovite grand princes. The author illumines the "Stalinist culture" the dictator promoted in everything from movies to "folk" songs, with its master themes of heroism and communal uplift. This gripping history is crucial reading for anyone seeking to understand Stalin or contemporary Soviet affairs. Photos.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

This remarkable sequel to Stalin As Revolutionary, 1879-1929 ( LJ 9/1/73) is at once the best of Tucker's many books and arguably the finest work in the burgeoning field of Stalin studies. The author's achievement synthesizes recent Soviet revelations, better-known sources on Stalin, and personal interviews into a major work of biography. Tucker's Stalin is neither simply mad nor opportunistic, but the methodical "Iosif Grozny," an idealized Ivan the Terrible, and, tragically for millions, one whose terror far surpassed that of any czar. Tucker's depiction of Stalin and the terror machine is persuasive; but more controversial is the assertion that the purges served a "cathartic function" of exculpating Stalin for his own conspiracy against the revolution. The psychological dimension coexists with the political. Thus, Stalin's decimation of foreign Communists is both an expression of xenophobia and preparation for the 1939 Hitler-Stalin Pact. Whatever one's judgment of author or subject, this book can be safely recommended for all academic and public libraries.
- Zachary T. Irwin, Penn State - Behrend Coll. , Erie
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: W W Norton & Co Inc
• Publication date: 1990
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 039302881X
• ISBN 13: 9780393028812
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 728