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Stalin and Togliatti: Italy and the Origins of the Cold War

Elena Agarossi, professor of contemporary history at the Scuola Superiore di Pubblica Amministrazione in Rome and member of the Wilson Center European Alumni Association will lead a panel discussion on her latest book entitled Stalin and Togliatti: Italy and the Origins of the Cold War.

Date & Time

Wednesday
Mar. 28, 2012
4:00pm – 5:30pm ET

Location

4th Floor, Woodrow Wilson Center
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Overview

Elena Agarossi, professor of contemporary history at the Scuola Superiore di Pubblica Amministrazione in Rome and member of the Wilson Center European Alumni Association will lead a panel discussion on her latest book entitled Stalin and Togliatti: Italy and the Origins of the Cold War.

The book was co-authored with Victor Zaslavsky, professor of political sociology at the Free International University for Social Sciences in Rome.

 Stalin and Togliatti reveals the dependence of the Italian Communist Party on Soviet decisionmaking in the early Cold War and the willingness of Stalin to sacrifice the interests of the Italian Communist Party to Soviet interests. It explores the connection between Italian domestic politics and international affairs during the final phases of the Second World War and in the first years of the Cold War.

The authors employ previously classified documents in Russian and Italian archives, including reports to Stalin on the virtually daily meetings of Palmiro Togliatti, head of the Italian Communist Party, with Soviet diplomats. This recent, post-revisionist scholarship underscores the role of Stalin's ambitions and their incompatibility with liberal-democratic systems in the development of the Cold War. Stalin and Togliatti come out as shrewd politicians, implacable enemies of the capitalist West, yet acutely aware of the limits of their power.

Stalin and Togliatti is a translation and expansion of a prize-winning book published in Italian in 1997 and updated in 2007.

Joining Agarossi on the panel is Vladislav Zubok, associate professor in the department of history at Temple University and Mark Kramer, director of the Harvard Project for Cold War Studies.

Christian F. Ostermann, director of the History and Public Policy Program will chair the event.

Stalin and Togliatti: Italy and the Origins of the Cold War was co-published by the Wilson Center Press as part of the CWIHP book series.

To purchase the book visit The Wilson Center Press website.

Visit www.CWIHP.org for more information on the CWIHP Book Series.

 

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History and Public Policy Program

The History and Public Policy Program makes public the primary source record of 20th and 21st century international history from repositories around the world, facilitates scholarship based on those records, and uses these materials to provide context for classroom, public, and policy debates on global affairs.  Read more

Cold War International History Project

The Cold War International History Project supports the full and prompt release of historical materials by governments on all sides of the Cold War. Through an award winning Digital Archive, the Project allows scholars, journalists, students, and the interested public to reassess the Cold War and its many contemporary legacies. It is part of the Wilson Center's History and Public Policy Program.  Read more

Global Europe Program

The Global Europe Program addresses vital issues affecting the European continent, US-European relations, and Europe’s ties with the rest of the world. We investigate European approaches to critical global issues: digital transformation, climate, migration, global governance. We also examine Europe’s relations with Russia and Eurasia, China and the Indo-Pacific, the Middle East and Africa. Our program activities cover a wide range of topics, from the role of NATO, the European Union and the OSCE to European energy security, trade disputes, challenges to democracy, and counter-terrorism. The Global Europe Program’s staff, scholars-in-residence, and Global Fellows participate in seminars, policy study groups, and international conferences to provide analytical recommendations to policy makers and the media.  Read more

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