66709 - History of Soviet Union's and Russian Foreign Policy

Learning outcomes

During classes students are expected to acquire a strong comparative methodology in order to approach the most relevant events of the foreign policy of Russia and Soviet Union from 1917 to nowadays. Students are particularly expected to develop an in-depth knowledge and a critical overview of a set of crucial documents in Russian/Soviet diplomacy that will be analysed during the lectures.

Course contents

The course focuses on foreign policy of Soviet Union and Russia during the 20th century. Still, particularly in the Soviet-Russian case, foreign policy cannot be studied without referring to the main dynamics of domestic policy as well. As a result, the course will start from the Lenin's strategies aimed at ending WW1 and the international intervention against the Bolshevik revolution in order to explore their impact in Europe and Asia at the beginning of the 20s. Then, the course will discuss the following domestic and international events that influence particularly the following geopolitical contexts: a) the neighbouring countries like Germany and Poland; b) the building of a policy for expanding the revolution through the Comintern; c) the building of the besieged fortress. After understanding the changes imposed by Stalin at the end of the 20s the course will focus on the attempt at supporting a collective security, the relations with nazism and the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, the reshaping of the relations with the UK and the USA and the war diplomacy including the Yalta agreements.

After WW2, the course will concentrate on the double Soviet policy towards the newly established Camp (from the limitations to sovereignty to the Helsinki accords and the role of the dissent) and the broader international context (from the confrontation with the USA to the contrasts with China and the attempts to expand in Africa). Students will be invited to consider that events in the light of the changes represented by the policy and the personalities of Khrushchev, Brezhnev and Gorbačëv. In the end the course will focus on the foreign policy of Gorbačëv, on the reasons that led to the creation of a CIS and on the main aspects of Russian foreign policy during Yeltsin and Putin.

Readings/Bibliography

  Compulsory readings:

1. Ronald Grigor Suny, The Soviet Experiment. Russia, the USSR and the Successor States, Oxford U. Press, New York, 1998.

2. Caroline Kennedy-Pipe, Russia and the World 1917-1991, Arnold, London, 1998.

3. Andrei Tsygankov, Russia's Foreign Policy. Change and Continuity in National Identity, Rowman and Littlefield, Lanham, 2013.

4. Stefano Bianchini, USSR and Soviet Bloc between Ideology and Realpolitik (1947-1958), IN: Antonio Varsori (ed.), Europe 1945-1990s. The End of an Era?, MacMillan, London, 1995, pp. 117-140

AND

Nicolai N. Petro, Russian Foreign Policy 2000-2010. From Nation State to Global Risk Sharing, in: PECOB’s Series 2011 at http://www.pecob.eu/flex/cm/pages/ServeBLOB.php/L/EN/IDPagina/3132.

 

Moreover students must have a sound knowledge of approximately 50 documents included in the following reading list

 

Documents on USSR and Russia in the world politics 1917-2014 (Students will receive the list of the documents during classes from the professor).

 

Students are also invited to refer to the following Atlas:

 

Martin Gilbert, Atlas of Russian History, Oxford University Press, New York, 1993

or

The Penguin Historical Atlas of Russia, Penguin Books, London, 1995.

 

 

Optional readings (one of the following is to be additionally select by those students from other programme than MIREES, who might not attend lectures):

 

1.            Robert Legvold (ed.), Russian Foreign Policy in the 21st Century and the Shadow of the Past, Columbia University Press, New York, 2007.

2.            Richard Sakwa, Putin. Russia's Choice, Routledge, London, 2004

3.            Dmitri Trenin, The End of Eurasia. Russia on the Borders between Geopolitics and Globalization, Carnegie End. for International Peace, Washington D.C., 2005.

4.            Gabriel Gorodetsky (a cura di), Russia between East and West. Russian Foreign Policy at the Threshold of the 21st Century, Frank Cass, London, 2003.

5.            Paul Kolstoe, Russians in the Former Soviet Republics, Indiana Univ. Press, Bloomington, 1995.

6.            Jeff Chinn and Robert Kaiser, Russians as the New Minority. Ethnicity and Nationalism in the Soviet Successor States, Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado, 1996.

7.            Hélène Carrère d'Encausse, The End of the Soviet Empire. The Triumph of the Nations, A New Republic Book-Basic Books, New York, 1993.

8.            Stephen K. Carter, Russian Nationalism. Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow, Pinter, London, 1990.

9.            Jakub M. Godzimirski, New and Old Actors in Russian Foreign Policy, Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, Oslo, 2000.

 

Teaching methods

Teaching tools are basically founded on frontal lectures with students' presentations during classes on the basis of the assigned readings lecture by lecture. Students will be invited to deepen different arguments and report by referring to the list of the documents available on the web site of the instructor, in order to learn how read and interpret them.

Assessment methods

Students are requested to pass an oral exam based on the suggested bibliography and the documents discussed during classes. The ability in presenting arguments and showing a comparative approach will be highly evaluate.

Students are requested to pass an oral exam based on both the suggested bibliography and the documents discussed during classes, when students are expected to make presentation. These presentations will be based on the selected documents that students will be able to download from a specific distribution list. Instructions in this sense will be delivered at the beginning of the course. Being the course based on methods of history research and study, students are expected to demonstrate an achieved critical analytical capacity by comparing primary sources (the documents) and the social, political and economic contexts of the documents under scrutiny that can be grasped from the literature and the readings explored during classes and the required presentations. The ability in presenting arguments and showing a comparative approach will be highly evaluated.

Please note: Students from other Italian programs and Exchange Students are requested to follow MIREES rules: therefore, in order to take the exam, they MUST have attended at least 70% of the lectures. NO exceptions are accepted.

Teaching tools

PowerPoint and overhead projector

Links to further information

http://www.eurobalk.net and http://www.unibo.it/SitoWebDocente/default.htm?UPN=stefano.bianchini@unibo.it

Office hours

See the website of Stefano Bianchini