Between 1906 and the outbreak of World War I, Moscow was the locale of great uncertainty and experimentation. Moscow's liberal leaders sought social and political stability for their city following the violence of the 1905 revolution by offering attractive programs in education, employment, housing and other areas to Moscow's unruly lower classes. They were countered in their efforts, however, by central authorities of the Old Regime, who feared the political effects of these programs and stressed social rigidity. Liberal City, Conservative State examines the resulting clash between...

The People's War lifts the Stalinist veil of secrecy to probe an almost untold side of World War II: the experiences of the Soviet people themselves. Drawing on a wealth of archival and recently published material, contributors detail the calculated destruction of a Jewish town by the Germans and present a chilling picture of life in occupied Minsk. They look at the wartime experience of intellectuals, for whom the period was a time of relative freedom, and discuss women's myriad roles in combat and other spheres of activity. They also reassess the behavior and morale of ordinary Red Army...

Terror, in the sense of mass, unjust arrests, characterized the USSR during the late 1930s. But, argues Robert Thurston in this controversial book, Stalin did not intend to terrorize the country and did not need to rule by fear. Memoirs and interviews with Soviet people indicate that many more believed in Stalin's quest to eliminate internal enemies than were frightened by it. Drawing on recently opened Soviet archives and other sources, Thurston shows that between 1934 and 1936 police and court practice relaxed significantly. Then a series of events, together with the tense international...