The period of Soviet history between Nikita Khrushchev’s fall from power in 1964, and the arrival of Mikhail Gorbachev as premier in 1985, has often been seen as a period of economic, social and political stagnation in the USSR. For the vast majority of this twenty year time frame, the USSR was governed by one man, Leonid Brezhnev. As such, the Brezhnev era has earned a reputation for being a flat-line in the development of the socialist experiment. However, this view is far from universal. 

To discuss the nature of Brezhnev’s rule in Russia, and particularly the extent to which it might be considered as period of stagnation, I am joined by John Keep, the emeritus professor of Russian history at the University Toronto. Since retiring in 1988, he has co-written a retrospective on Stalininsm, and has also produced a fantastic overview of the Soviet Period in his “A History of the Soviet Union 1945-1991: The Last of the Empires” which is recommended core reading for the study of the USSR.

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Today’s episode is the second of a two part programme with Dr Martin
McCauley, formerly a senior lecturer in Russian and European history at the University of London. Dr McCauley has a long standing interest in the Soviet Union, having conducted research there in the late 1950s. He is the author of a wide range of books on the Soviet Union, including The Khruschev Era, and the excellent, Rise and Fall of the Soviet Union. 

In this programme I discuss the issues of historical approaches and methods  with Dr McCauley and try to find out a bit more about how he came to his conclusions on the Soviet Union. This is a fascinating insight into how pastiches of a country are built up over time.

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