Description
For both the United States and the Soviet Union, asserts Heller (history, U. of Manitoba, Canada), the Cold War served as a means of blocking internal social and political revolutions around the world be redefining them in terms of international ideological and state rivalry between East and West. He explores the evolution of the Cold War as an international system from its original construction in the wake of World War II to the fall of the Soviet Union, looking first at the imposition of Stalinism in Europe and the expansion of the communist sphere through revolutions in China, Korea, and Vietnam in combination with the US construction of a global system of military bases and political alliances intended both as a counter to communism and as a means to project its own power abroad. He also examines how the decolonization and national liberation movements of Asia and Africa, as well as the populist rebellions and revolutions in Latin America, were influenced by the international Cold War system and explores the 1970s transition from third world revolution to neoliberalism. Annotation ©2007 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
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The Cold War and the New Imperialism is an account of global history since 1945, which brings massive changes in global politics, economics, and society together in a single narrative, illuminating and clarifying the dilemmas of the present. Written for the general reader, it draws together scholarly research from a wide range of sources without losing sight of the larger pattern of events.In the sixty-year period since the end of World War II, the world has indeed been remade. The war itself mobilized the political and social aspirations of hundreds of millions of people. The contest between the United States and the Soviet Union for global dominance drew every country into its field of force. Struggles for national liberation in the Third World brought an end to colonial empires. Revolutions in China, Cuba, Vietnam and elsewhere shook the global order, as did failed uprisings in Paris and Prague. Since the end of the Cold War the forces of the capitalist market have overwhelmed social institutions that have given meaning to human existence for centuries.But the end of the Cold War has created as many problems for the world’s remaining superpower, the United States, as it has solved. With its political, economic, and financial hegemony eroding, the United States has responded with military adventures abroad and increasing inequality and authoritarianism at home. The Cold War and the New Imperialism draws all these threads together and shows vividly that the end of history is not in sight.
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