One More 'Lost Peace'?: Rethinking the Cold War After Twenty Years

by Raffaele D'Agata, Lawrence Gray

Overview

Were there any missed chances to build a more peaceful world than the present one after the Cold War? Were there any attempts at working out a more comprehensive and more cooperative way to overcome it? What was precisely at stake during the Cold War? What was really at stake for the 'losers' and what stakes did the 'winners' gain —- if there are any 'winners' at all? Those questions were raised during a seminar where some outstanding scholars were invited to discuss them plainly before an audience of young students in an ancient, yet 'peripheral' Italian university. The result may be seen as a readable concentration of basic and meaningful insights that often defy a noticeable amount of conventional wisdom on the ground of careful and authoritative scholarly research.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780761853954
Publisher:	University Press of America
Publication date:	11/26/2010
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	118
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Raffaele D'Agata is professor of contemporary history at the University of Sassari. He has published books on international twentieth-century history, including Da Monaco a Bretton Woods: l'evoluzione transnazionale degli interessi e degli scopi (Milan: Franco Angeli, 1989) and La nemesi dei prestadenaro : economia mondiale e Guerra fredda, 1944-1948 (Soveria Mannelli: Rubbettino, 2001). Lawrence Gray is professor of political science and international relations at John Cabot University in Rome. His publications include The Italian Communist Party: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow (Greenwood Press, 1980), co-edited with Simon Serfaty; Corporate Activities in the Era of Global Economy (Tokyo: Keizai University Press, 1992); and L'America di Roosevelt negli anni dell'esilio di Luigi Sturzo (Soveria Mannelli: Rubbettino, 2002).

Table of Contents

Preface v

Introduction vii

Section I What Was at Stake for the ?Losers??

Soviet Ambivalences, Western Overstatements Wilfried Loth 3

Ideas and Power: The Soviet Inner Debates in the 1970s Odd Arne Westad 13

An Actor in Search of a Theory: Explaining Gorbachev's Decision Making in 1989 Rodolfo Ragionieri 21

Panel: On Revisions and Comparisons

Section II What Stakes Did The ?Winners? Gain? 41

Ostpolitik, Euro-Communism, and Détente: Responding to the World Crisis Raffaele D'Agata 49

An Uneasy Empire: Myth, Obsession, Identity and American Policy Lawrence Gray 73

The Defeat of the Third World: The Case of the Horn of Africa Gian Paolo Calchi Novati 83

Panel: The Security Issue and the Chances of Western Communism 101

The Contributors 107

What People are Saying About This

Odd Arne Westad

Raffaele D'Agata is one of Italy's best known historians of the Cold War era.

Editorial Reviews

Raffaele D'Agata is one of Italy's best known historians of the Cold War era.

Odd Arne Westad