Product Details

Foreign Policy in Focus

Soviet Fates and Lost Alternatives finds its stride in Cohen's ability to challenge conventional wisdom on the causes and consequences of major turning points in Soviet and post-Soviet history.

— Rehanna Jones-Boutaleb

World Policy Blog

Cohen offers us a lesson, and a solution that is at once simple and of priceless value.

— David A. Andelman

Montreal Review

this is one of the first books I would put into the hands of someone who wanted to get a good sense of what the Soviet Union was all about.

— Lars T. Lih

Current History

[George] Kennan's understanding of the Russian state... has proved to have enormous currency over time. Cohen's views should be given similar credence.

— William W. Finan Jr.

Slavic Review

An extraordinarily rich book... an absolutely vital beginning point for anyone interested in a serious study of political and foreign policy developments involving Russia.

The Nation

Cohen... brings his study of Soviet and Russian political developments to the doorstep of the White House, to powerful effect.

Russian Review

Well written and vigorously argued.

— Archie Brown

New York Review of Books

Provocative and insightful.

— Amy Knight

What People Are Saying

A brilliant and important book. Stephen Cohen is one of the world's foremost thinkers about Russia—its past, present, and future.

— Dan Rather, global correspondent and managing editor, Dan Rather Reports, HDNet

What People Are Saying

Stephen F. Cohen is one of those writers who keeps real history visible while making striking and controversial policy arguments. This masterly investigation of 'lost opportunities' is necessary background for understanding Russia and the world today, giving us an opportunity for essential historical and political debate. Critics will challenge him, but Cohen is likely to emerge triumphant.

— Robert Conquest, author of The Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and the Terror-Famine

What People Are Saying

Stephen F. Cohen is one of our most astute historians of both the Soviet Union and Russia. Soviet Fates and Lost Alternatives once again demonstrates his encyclopedic grasp of his subject, his knack for original archival research, his deep wisdom, and an unerring ability to make difficult concepts intelligible. This book is a brilliant and probing analysis of U.S. relations with the Kremlin from Stalin to Putin. Read it!

— Douglas Brinkley, author of The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast

What People Are Saying

Stephen F. Cohen is far and away the most original, creative, informed, and insightful observer writing on Russian affairs today. A pioneering historian and a fine political scientist and journalist with a tireless commitment to ferreting out elusive evidence, Cohen has had extensive, first-hand experience in both Soviet and post-Soviet Russia, close contacts among contemporary Russian leaders, and a unique following among Russian intellectuals. Known for his bold, independent, passionately held, and often provocative ideas, he is respected even by many who strongly disagree with him. Cohen writes with clarity, elegance, and power.

— Alexander Rabinowitch, author of The Bolsheviks Come to Power: The Revolution of 1917 in Petrograd

• Table of Contents

Table of Contents