History in Focus

The British contingent of the MNF, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Image courtesy of the Imperial War Museum (photo reference: CT951)

Articles

Was the Cold War driven by the superpowers or the periphery?

History in Focus invited ten academics to answer this question from their own research perspective. The resulting pieces, listed below, illustrate the breadth and depth of historical research relating to the Cold War. Different perspectives, different foci and different methodologies have guided the authors of these articles, and we hope they will be of interest to historians and students of the Cold War, and of the military, political, cultural and social history of the second half of the twentieth century.

Articles index

Introductions to the question

• Cold War and the periphery

  by John Kent

• The world the superpowers made

  by Jeremi Suri

Cultural aspects

• The Cold War and the early space race

  by Matthew Godwin

• Superpowers and periphery: a religious perspective

  by Dianne Kirby and Michael Mahadeo

• Periphery and centre: German musicians in the early Cold War

  by Toby Thacker

• Cultural drives by the periphery: Britain's experiences

  by Aiko Watanabe

Regional perspectives

• Cold War on the periphery: the case of King Hussein of Jordan

  by Nigel Ashton

• Who used whom? Baathist Iraq and the Cold War, 1968–1990

  by Geraint Hughes

• The Berlin Wall crisis: the view from below

  by Patrick Major

• A home front in the Cold War: Hungary, 1948–1989

  by Mark Pittaway

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Created Spring 2006 by the Institute of Historical Research.
Copyright notice.