From the Book - First U.S. edition.
Origins and development. The idea of communism ; Communism and socialism : the early years ; The Russian revolutions and civil war ; "Building socialism" : Russia and the Soviet Union, 1917-40 ; International communism between the two world wars ; What do we mean by a communist system?
Communism ascendant. The appeals of communism ; Communism and the Second World War ; The communist takeovers in Europe : indigenous paths ; The communist takeovers in Europe : Soviet impositions ; The communists take power in China ; Post-war Stalinism and the break with Yugoslavia
Surviving without Stalin. Khrushchev and the Twentieth Party Congress ; Zig-zags on the road to "communism" ; Revisionism and revolution in Eastern Europe ; Cuba : a Caribbean communist state ; China : from the "Hundred Flowers" to "Cultural Revolution" ; Communism in Asia and Africa ; The "Prague Spring" ; "The era of stagnation" : the Soviet Union under Brezhnev
Pluralizing pressures. The challenge from Poland : John Paul II, Lech Wałesa, and the rise of Solidarity ; Reform in China : Deng Xiaoping and after ; The challenge of the West
Interpreting the fall of communism. Gorbachev, Perestroika, and the attempt to reform communism, 1985-87 ; The dismantling of Soviet communism, 1988-89 ; The end of communism in Europe ; The break-up of the Soviet state ; Why did communism last so long? ; What caused the collapse of communism? ; What's left of communism?
