B2873 - History of the Soviet Union and Russia

Learning outcomes

The course aims at providing students with in-depth knowledge of Soviet and Russian history since 1917. 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. By the end of the course students will be able to: - describe the main stages of Soviet and Russian history; - contextualise specific events of Soviet and Russian history within broader social, political, economic frames; - critically analyse key primary sources and effectively present the major scholarly debates on the subject matter.

Course contents

The history of the Russian empire, the Soviet Union and the post-Soviet states in the 20^th century may seem to be molded in violence and radical changes, resulting in a material crisis and a new kind of imperialism. Yet this history is also one of great political and social projects, a form of modernization, a worldwide influence, and audacious and innovative – if unsuccessful to reach the ascribed purpose – nationality policies. The course explores some of the main dimensions of Soviet and Russian history in the 20^th century, in two successive sections.

The Lecture section (A: 16 hours, 14.09-08.10.2026), common to all students, examines the tension between the temptation to great power on the one hand (a statist tendency), and the projection outwards of an internationalist ideology on the other hand. It introduces students to the general chronology of Soviet (and post-Soviet Russian) foreign policy and to the specificity of the Soviet universalist project (Marxist-Leninism, Komintern, Kominform, socialist camp). This section evokes the utopian beliefs and projects of the first decades (the interwar period) and then studies in greater depth the policy of late-Stalinist USSR and afterwards, up to the early 21st century.

The Seminar section (B: 12 hours, one class per week for each student, 3.11-15.12.2026) divides students in two groups, along a theme to be chosen by them between:

· SEMINAR 1 (Tuesdays) focusing on law and authority, crime and repression in the Soviet Union. How did the Tsarist autocrats and then the Marxist Bolsheviks conceive of law and justice? how the state policy itself criminalized behaviors such as political non-alignment, work indiscipline, marginal activities; how the central place taken by the Gulag in Soviet society left deep imprint on the minds and the communities after its disappearance. Finally, we will discuss post-Soviet Russia and the legal dualism (K. Hendley, G. Favarel-Garrigues)

· SEMINAR 2 (Thursdays) focuses on a lesser known area of the Soviet Union, Central Asia. The case studies of the irrigation of the Aral Sea basin (M. Peterson, 2019) and of the construction of a dam in Tajikistan (A. Kalinovsky, 2018) will offer the possibility of exploring the themes of Russian colonialism and Soviet ‘decolonization’, perception of otherness and backwardness versus Soviet drive to modernization, and eventually Soviet Tajikistan in the Cold War

[NB: in 2027/28 SEM 2 will explore the complex relationship of Russia to Europe, both in terms of political values and representations of itself, and in terms of limits. Where Europe ends and Russia begins, if the latter doesn’t ‘belong’ to the former but pursues its own, specific path (the myth of a ‘Sonderweg’ à la russe can be followed from the ‘Moscow, Third Rome’ of the 16^th century to the latest historical considerations of the current president)?]

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Readings/Bibliography

The first eight classes will mainly rely on writings on Bolshevik early revolutionary theory, then on Silvio Pons, The Global Revolution (2014) and Sergey’s Radchenko To Run the World. The Kremlin's Cold War Bid for Global Power (2024).

The six seminar classes demand mandatory readings (6 chapters or journal articles)

For students who have not approached Russian or Soviet history in their past curriculum it is highly recommended (and mandatory for undergraduates in exchange) to study Edele, Mark. The Soviet Union. A Short History. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2019, or Fitzpatrick, Sheila. The Shortest History of the Soviet Union, Columbia University Press, 2022 (it was translated into italian: Breve Storia Dell’Unione Sovietica. Milano: Bompani, 2023). Undergraduates in exchange will be tested on this general knowledge, aside from the general program common to all attending students of the course, during the midterm oral.

The readings necessary to prepare yourself for the exam differ a little depending on the mode of attendance. Please find all the details on the exam on the page Virtuale.

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Teaching methods

Important, for exchange students: the admission to optional courses of the LM/Master IR (like this one) is allowed to incoming students at Master level. Undergraduate students must be prepared as no special adjustment is made for us, even if they did not study Soviet history before (see section “Readings / ‘For students who have not approached Russian or Soviet history in their past curriculum….’”)

ONLY Students enrolled in the MA MIREES can attend classes in presence in Bologna or online on MS Teams, but they must follow the MIREES rules of attendance (70% of the classes).

The course is organized in lectures and seminars, along the "Y" system: a common bloc of frontal lectures and a bloc where students distribute themselves in two smaller seminar groups. The Lecture section introduces students to the core tenets of the Soviet foreign policy during 8 frontal lectures. A midterm oral then checks students understanding and assimilation of this fundamental knowledge. The Seminar section puts students in the situation of discussing papers they read and prepared before class.

The lectures are held on Tu. from 9.00 to 11.00 AM and Thursd. from 09.00 to 11.00 AM. Please check the precise calendar of classes posted below. Each student should attend 14 classes in total, or 28 hours.

Students are required to carefully read the assigned material before the classes. Active participation through the discussion of existing scholarship and case studies is highly recommended in the Lecture section, and mandatory in the Seminar section.

Section A. Frontal lectures for all students

Class 1: Introduction. The Bolsheviks, the World Revolution and the War Tu 15.9

Class 2: From Global Revolution to the Great Break Tu 17.9

Class 3: “Time of State, and of Empire”, 1934-45 Thurs 22.9

Class 4: “Time of Empire and rising tensions”, 1945-49 Tu 24.9

Class 5: From imperial dominance to disunity, 1947-68 Thurs 29.9

Class 6: Irreformable communism? , 1968-81 Tu 01.10

Class 7: “Time of Crisis”, 1985-91 Thurs 06.10

Class 8: The 1990s to today Tu 08.10

Midterms exams: in person, in the professor’s office, Tuesd. 20 Oct, 9.00-11.00 or Thursd. 22 Oct 9.00-11.00 at students’ choice.

Section B (Seminaries SEM1 and SEM2)

Two Alternative Seminars of 6 lectures (2 hrs each) aim to provide occasions for in-depth discussions of specific topics. During those classes, the students are required to participate actively, by preparing at least 3 texts out of the 6 studied (homework to send in advance to the professor) and then engaging in discussions in class among themselves and with the professor. Students who would not have delivered prep work on the 3 texts assigned will shift to non-attending mode.

Dates:

SEM 1 SEM2

Tuesday 3.11 Thursday 5.11

Tuesday 10.11 Thursday 12.11

Tuesday 17.11 Thursday 19.11

Tuesday 24.11 Thursday 26.11

Tuesday 1.12 Thursday 3.12

Tuesday 15.12 Thursday 10.12

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Assessment methods

For ATTENDING STUDENTS the exam is composed of two parts.

· The first part consists in a Mid-Term oral exam (2 open-ended questions on the Section 1). This first part of the exam will count for 50% of the grade. Students are invited to clarify any misunderstanding on the content of the lectures and of the midterm exam during the 8 classes, or during the professor’s office hours (published monthly in the section “News” of the professor’s page)

The mid-term oral exam will take place in presence on either Tues 20 Oct (9-11.00) or on Thursd 22 October (9.00-11.00). Students who can not attend this exam must shift to the status of non-attending students.

· The second part consists in an active participation during the 6 seminars and a final short essay pertaining to Section 2 (50% of grade). Participation in the seminar classes means delivering by email to the professor at least 3 weekly reading assignments before the class in which the reading will be discussed. Both the guidelines for the reading assignments and for the final essay are explained by the professor and available on the Virtuale page of the course.

The use of AI-powered tools for any of the works to be delivered is strictly limited along lines explained by the professor at the beginning of the course, and available also on the “Virtuale” space of the course: limited to summaries, rephrasing. Substantial use of AI to complete parts of the exam is not permitted.

For NON-ATTENDING STUDENTS the final exam consists in one oral exam of 25 to 40 minutes with four open questions pertaining both to Section A and to the topics of Section B-SEM1 or B-SEM2. Therefore non-attending students must also choose one of the 2 seminars and its reading list.Please find all the details on the exam on the page Virtuale of the course.

EXAM CALLS: The first call for both attending (delivery of the final essay) and non-attending (single oral) students' is fixed immediately after the end of the classes in Dec. 2026 (prioritarily for students in exchange), the second Jan. 2027. Call 3 and 4 are scheduled in late June/early July 2026, calls 5 and 6 in late August-early September 2027.

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Graduation Policy

The final overall grade will be in the range 18-30:

- 30 cum laude (outstanding, sure grasp of all the material and many interesting insights)

- 28-30 (excellent, sure grasp of all the material and some interesting insights)

- 26-27 (very good, competent grasp of all the material)

- 24-25 (good, competent grasp of some the material)

- 21-23 (satisfactory, partial grasp of the material)

- 18-20 (pass, barely sufficient grasp of the material)

- 17 or below (fail, insufficient grasp of the material).

Teaching tools

The course will make use of ppt and audio-visuals whenever necessary.

The page Virtuale of the course contains additional information on the topics studied, the exam format, the available bibliography, and the enrolment in the dates for the midterm orals.

Students with learning disorders and\or temporary or permanent disabilities are invited to contact the office responsible (https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en/for-students ) as soon as possible so that they can propose acceptable adjustments. The request for adaptation of the exam must be submitted in advance (15 days before the exam date) to the lecturer, who will assess the appropriateness of the adjustments, taking into account the teaching objectives.

Office hours

See the website of Vanessa Denise Aline Voisin