The End of the Cold War: Its Meaning and Implications

by Michael J. Hogan (Editor)

This timely collection of essays offers one of the first, serious efforts to examine the end of the Cold War. The book presents the thinking of leading historians, political scientists, policy analysts, and commentators from the United States, Great Britain, Germany, France, Norway and the former Soviet Union. Together they discuss such important issues as the origins of the Cold War, its ideological and geopolitical sources, the cost of that epic conflict, its influence on American life and institutions, its winners and losers.

Genres: History, Politics, Nonfiction

316 pages, Hardcover

First published June 26, 1992

About the author

Michael J. Hogan (born 1943) is an American academic who has served in the administrations or on the faculty of many American universities, wrote or edited numerous books, contributed as an adviser to the U. S. Department of State and several documentaries. Currently he is a distinguished professor of history at the University of Illinois at Springfield.

Reviews

[Joseph Stieb · Rating 4 out of 5]

A solid collection of essays from just after the end of the Cold War from many influential scholars. Although there are a few cranks in here (Noam Chomsky makes his usual appearance), most of the essays are very thoughtful and well-supported. One prominent theme in the book is that US victory in the Cold War might be a hollow victory as countries like Germany and Japan rise to challenge its economic dominance and certain parts of the Third World spin out of control. The better writers in this book note that US power and wealth in the Cold War was artificially high because of the destruction of WWII and the halting emergence of powerful economies in the non-Western world. This is also a very good book for learning the basic historiography of the Cold War because Hogan pulls in writers from all the major schools. In sum, this is a good read for any student of USFP or international history in the modern world.