Debating the Cold War: Did Ideology Matter?

As part of a workshop hosted by the Reluctant Internationalists research group on ‘Debating the Cold War’, Polly Jones (Oxford), Anita Prazmowska (LSE), Diana Georgescu (SSEES), Dina Fainberg (Amsterdam) and Anatoly Pinsky (St Petersburg/Helsinki) discuss did ideology matter during the Cold War? The panel, chaired by Ana Antic (Birkbeck) explores the common juxtaposition between the supposed waning significance of ‘ideology’ in the West with the overly rigid ideological regimentation of the East; the notion that while ideology permeated every aspect of private and public lives in the East, the Western private self was shielded from ideological influences, or that there was no dominant political ideology in the West. The panel also examines other, partially contradictory, themes from established Cold War narratives including, the rejection of Marxism in Eastern Europe especially among intellectuals after the major disappointments of 1956 or 1968 and the idea that Marxism was never genuinely adopted except by a small number of brainwashed party cadres. For more information - bit.ly/2nkGWiQ