Review: Nationalism and the Breakup of an Empire
| Author | L.W. Gluchowski |
| Published date | 01 December 1994 |
| Date | 01 December 1994 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/002070209404900411 |
| Subject Matter | Review |
REVIEWS
955
and
plausible
explanation
of
Soviet
thinking and
policy.
Until
new
sources
appear,
this
book
will
remain
one
of
the
best
analyses
of
the
development
of
Soviet
security policy
in
the
Gorbachev
years.
Paul
Marantz/University
of
British
Columbia
NATIONALISM
AND
THE
BREAKUP
OF
AN
EMPIRE
Russia
and
its
periphery
Edited
by
Miron
Rezun
Westport CT:
Greenwood,
1992,
x,
193pp,
US$
42.9 5
The
sudden
and
revolutionary
collapse
of
the
Soviet
experiment
has
understandably
received
a
great
deal
of
attention. The
decomposition
of
a
great
historic
European-Asian
empire
has
not.
This
volume
is
a
worthy
contribution
to
the
growing
debate
about
the
evolution,
nature,
and consequences of
Soviet
nationalities
policy,
the role
played
by
eth-
nic
and
minority
nationalism
in
the
failure
of
Mikhail
Gorbachev's
reform programme,
and
the
future
of
nationalist
and
separatist
senti-
ments
in
this
vast
multinational region.
Not
all
the contributions
are
of
equal
value,
as
with many
edited
volumes.
Yet
Rezun
does
a
splendid
job
of
editing and
manages
to
weave
together
a
fine
book.
His
stated
theme
-
to
survey
the
long
struggle
of
the
Soviet
empire
with
its
seat
of government
at
the
centre
and
to
analyze
both
the disintegration
of that
centre and
the collapse
of
its
periphery
-
has
largely
been
accomplished.
The
essays
are
divided
into
five
parts
that
focus
on
the
centre,
on
the
European,
Caucasian,
and
Muslim
peripheries,
and
on
the
inter-
national dimensions.
Eleven
specialists,
including
nine
Canadians,
dis-
cuss
distinct
but
interrelated
subjects such
as
Soviet
nationalities
policy,
the
Soviet
military
and
the
nationality question,
the
Latvian
independ-
ence
movement, Ukrainian
nationalism,
the Georgian
struggle
for
independence,
contemporary
Armenian
nationalism,
the
Islamic
bor-
derlands, and
American
and
French
responses
to
the
historic
Lithua-
nian
declaration
of
independence.
In
general
the authors
are
insightful
and
never
let the
reader
forget
the
sheer
complexity
of
the economic,
political,
and
social
changes
that
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