Professor Kristina Spohr, SAR 2.17

This course is available to General Course ‘Spring Semester’ students.

Based upon a variety of primary sources, this course will explore why and how in the second half of the 1980s the East-West conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union transformed itself so suddenly and peacefully into the collapse of (European) communism, German unification and the end of the USSR and her empire, while China took an entirely different exit from the Cold War era. In doing so, we will ask what was the correlation between "high" and "low politics" in these events and processes? Topics will include: the Chinese crackdown and the eastern European revolutions; German unification: domestic and international aspects; Kohl, Mitterrand and the road to the European Union; the collapse of the Soviet 'empire'; the Baltic independence struggle, Yeltsin and the Moscow coup; Soviet disintegration and Yugoslavia’s implosion; explanations and interpretations of the Cold War endgame. The discussion in each seminar will draw on a combination of primary and secondary material.

Ten 110-minute live seminars, on campus or on Zoom as circumstances dictate, with various weekly activities determined by the teacher and bilateral essay planning supervision. There will be a reading week in the LT.

Students will be required to submit a practice essay (1,500 words) during the LT.

A detailed course outline and reading list, subdivided by weekly topics, as well as a document pack will be available at the beginning of the course on Moodle. The following works are recommended as essential reading: K Spohr, Post Wall Post Square (2019); P Zelikow & C Rice, To Build a Better World (2019); S Dockrill, The End of the Cold War Era (2005); O A Westad et al (eds), The Cambridge History of the Cold War, vols 2-3 (2010); M E Sarotte, 1989 (2009); Hal Brands, The Unipolar Moment (2016); A Brown, The Gorbachev Factor (1996); R L Garthoff, The Great Transition (1994); Idem, Détente and confrontation (1985); J Levesque, The Enigma of 1989 (1997); C S Maier, Dissolution (1997); H Adomeit, Imperial Overstretch (1998); R Summy & M E Salla (eds), Why the Cold War Ended (1995). Also students should familiarise themselves with the Cold War International History Project homepage (http://www.wilsoncentre.org) and in particular: Bulletins No 5 'Cold War Crises', No 8-9 'The Cold War in the Third World and the Collapse of Detente in the 1970s', and No 12/13 'The End of the Cold War'.

Essay (100%, 5000 words) in the LT.