The early years of the Cold War were marked by contradictions and conflict. The turn from Stalin's discourse of danger to the discourse of difference under his successors explains the abrupt changes in relations with Eastern Europe, China, the decolonizing world, and the West. Societal constructivism provides the theoretical approach to make sense of this turbulent history

• Preface


• Chapter One, Introduction


• Chapter Two, Stalinism after the War: A Discourse of Danger, 1945-53


• Chapter Three, Stalin's Foreign Policy: The Discourse of Danger Abroad, 1945-53


• Chapter Four, The Thaw at Home, 1953-58


• Chapter Five, The Thaw Abroad, 1953-58


• Chapter Six, Conclusions


• References

Ted Hopf is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Ohio State University. He is the author or editor of five books, including Social Construction of International Politics: Identities and Foreign Policies, Moscow, 1955 and 1999 (Cornell 2002), which won the 2003 Marshall D. Shulman Award, presented by the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies for the best book published that year on the international politics of the former Soviet Union and Central Europe. Hopf received his B.A. from Princeton University in 1983 and Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1989. He was a Fulbright Professor in the autumn of 2001 at the European University at St. Petersburg. His research has been supported by the Ford Foundation, and the Olin and Davis Centers at Harvard University.