Moshe Lewin

"In this Now-Classic Book, The Making of the Soviet System, Moshe Lewin traces the transformation of Russian society and the Russian political system in the period between the two world wars, a transformation that was to lead to Stalinism in the 1930s. Lewin focuses on the changes stemming from war, revolution, civil war, and industrialization, and he discusses such topics as rural society and religion in the twentieth century; the background of Soviet collectivization; Soviet prewar policies of agricultural procurement; the kolkhoz and the muzhik; Leninism and Bolshevism; industrial relations during the five-year plans of 1928-1941; and the social background of Stalinism. Through this comprehensive approach to understanding the origins and problems of Stalinism, Lewin makes a significant contribution to the study of Russia's social history before the revolution as well as in the Soviet period."--BOOK JACKET.

"In The Soviet Century Moshe Lewin traces the USSR's history in all its complexity, drawing widely upon previously unavailable archive material. Highlighting key factors such as demography, economics, culture and political repression, Lewin guides us through the inner workings of a system which is still barely understood. In the process, he overturns widely held beliefs about the USSR's leaders, the state - party system and the Soviet bureaucracy - the 'tentacled octopus' which held real power." "Departing from a simple linear history, The Soviet Century takes in all the continuities and ruptures that led, via a complex route, from the founding revolution of October 1917 to the final collapse of the late 1980s and early 1990s, passing through the Stalinist dictatorship and the impossible reforms of the Khrushchev years."--Jacket.

Moshe Lewin's major new book is an original and important work that clarifies the sweeping changes that transformed Russia in the twentieth century from a muzhik country to the urban power we read about today. As in his previous works, Professor Lewin's extraordinary breadth of knowledge and sympathy allow him to deal with the "grand narrative of cultural transformation" that goes well beyond simple studies of urban growth or industrialization. The Soviet Union, as Lewin reminds us, was a rural country well into the post-World War II era, becoming predominantly urban only in the mid-1960s. The fascinating story that emerges from this book is one of a country that is becoming increasingly more complex even as it retains a "relatively primative configuration of power.". Professor Lewin goes on to show the historical roots of recent change. In the 1920s it was the government that was impatient to change, while society was transforming itself slowly. Recent years have seen a reversal of this situation, where a largely bureaucratic state simply lost its ability to govern a rapidly changing society. Professor Lewin's analysis lays bare the underlying causes behind the present chaos in the former Soviet Union, where a government that barely understands the new forces that have been so dramatically unleashed finds itself totally unable to control them.