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Rethinking the Historiography of the Soviet Bloc: The Totalitarianism Paradigm and Institutional Practices under Communism

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Rethinking the Historiography of the Soviet Bloc

The Totalitarianism Paradigm and Institutional Practices under Communism

Edited by Manuela Ungureanu

502 pages, 1 illus., bibliog., index

ISBN  978-1-83695-352-4 $180.00/£138.00 / Hb / Not Yet Published (March 2026)

eISBN 978-1-83695-353-1 eBook Not Yet Published


View CartYour country: - edit Recommend to your LibraryAvailable in GOBI®

Description

Addressing polarized narratives of authoritarian control and societal resistance, this volume reconsiders the totalitarianism paradigm in the study of the Soviet Bloc. Historians, philosophers, and literary scholars explore both its enduring explanatory power and its conceptual limits, drawing on insights from social epistemology and the history of social sciences. Case studies on Czechoslovakia, Romania, Poland, Hungary, the former GDR, Ukraine and the Soviet Union reveal how education, publishing, and cultural production shaped institutional life and intra-bloc interactions. The contributions develop new historiographical standards for understanding the complex interplay between imperial influence and local agency across the diverse societies of the former socialist world, while exploring the potential of various social-theoretical frameworks.

Manuela Ungureanu is associate professor of philosophy at the University of British Columbia, Okanagan. She has published on Donald Davidson’s interpretation theory and has examined issues in the philosophy of language following Chomsky’s universal grammar. Her work, which is at the interface between cognitive psychology and social epistemology, has appeared in journals such as Dialogue and AVANT as well as edited volumes including Romanian Studies in the Philosophy of Science (2015) and From an Analytical Point of View (2025).

Subject: History: 20th Century to Present
Area: Central/Eastern Europe


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