Rebellious Satellite: Poland 1956
Book Discussion with Author Pawel Machcewicz

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October 09 2009, 12:30 p.m. - 1:30 p.m.

Event Details

Rebellious Satellite: Poland 1956 offers a social history of the mass movements that prompted political change and altered Polish-Soviet relations in 1956 but avoided a Soviet armed response. The manuscript is based largely on new archival materials (mainly Party and security apparatus documents) that were originally prepared to provide detailed information to the Party leadership about what was happening on the ground. The book includes a selection of photographs from Poznan in June 1956 taken secretly by the police.

Pawel Machcewicz will focus on the people's expression of grievances, and even riots—as opposed to "top-level" activities such as internal Communist Party struggles. The author will discuss the protests that took place in Poznan in June 1956 and across Poland the following October and November. Joining Machcewicz will be Charles Gati professor of Russian and Eurasian Studies at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University.

Pawel Machcewicz is a professor of history at the University of Warsaw. He has also taught at the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun and holds an affiliation with the Institute of Political Studies in Warsaw. He was recently named the Polish Prime Minister's personal representative for the creation of a new World War II Museum in Gdansk. Machcewicz is the author of Rebellious Satellite: Poland 1956. (2009) and a former Cold War International History Project Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

Charles Gati is a professor of Russian and Eurasian Studies and a Foreign Policy Institute fellow at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. He has also taught at Union College and Columbia University and has served as a senior member of the Policy Planning Staff of the U.S. Department of State. Gati has written extensively on European-Russian relations and is co-author, editor, co-editor and contributor to more than 16 volumes. His articles and op-eds have appeared in Foreign Affairs and other professional journals and leading newspapers in the United States and abroad. Gati is the author of several monographs including Failed Illusions: Moscow, Washington, Budapest and the 1956 Hungarian Revolt (2006) and Hungary and the Soviet Bloc (1986), both of which have received the Marshall Shulman Prize for outstanding book on the international relations of the former Soviet bloc.

Cold War International History Project
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