Bookverdict.com

These books examine distinct aspects of Marxism and communism (i.e., as social movement, political theory, and transitional regime). None approaches the magisterial breadth of Leszek Kolakowski's Main Currents of Marxism (Oxford Univ. Pr., 1978), but each demonstrates its subject's intellectual relevance and scholarly vitality, and each confronts questions that will remain long after communism's passing. For example, Legacies of the Collapse of Marxism includes several essays on nationalism after communism. Despite the absence of a single focus, the careful choice of authors-Francis Fukuyama, Craig Calhoun, and Daniel Chirot, among others-explain this anthology's success. Nevertheless, some readers will detect a conservative bias among the contributors. Thus, Seymour Martin Lipset explains "model" Western researchers' failure to anticipate communism's collapse as a pa...Log In or Sign Up to Read More