This short and updated introduction by one of Europe's leading specialists in Russian and Soviet history presents a broad survey combined with a penetrating analysis of the key issues of the Russian Revolution, such as the nature of pre-Revolutionary society and politics, the many links between war and revolution (e.g., the effects of the war on the Bolshevik theory of revolution), the possibilities open to the Provisional Government, political alternatives to Bolshevism, and the place of the Revolution in contemporary intellectual debate in the West. The particular originality of this volume lies in the fact that the author also examines the way in which these issues were viewed both at the time and later. He looks at contemorary (1917) assumptions, at the validity of questions traditionally asked about the Revolution, and concerns himself with the degree of hindsight and ideological basis contained both in the questions themselves and in the answers usually given to them. The author's knowledge of works in Russian as well as in German, English and French add to the indispensability of this book.

This book offers a fresh and stimulating analysis of the often elusive relationship between domestic and foreign policy in Russia before the First World War. Dietrich Geyer, one of Germany's leading historians of Russia, discusses a wide variety of economic, fiscal, institutional, and ideological developments within imperial Russia. In so doing, he brings into sharp relief the difficulties faced by the ruling elites in maintaining Russia's great power position in Europe, the Near East, and the Far East. Now available in English for the first time, this widely acclaimed book will be welcomed as an indispensable resource by all those who were unable to read the original German edition. "By far the most perceptive, knowledgeable, and intelligent work on the last half century of imperial Russia in print." -Theodore H. Von Laue, Russian History "This important, tightly packed book... analyzes the basic problems of Russian imperialism thoroughly and with enormous erudition.... Scholars concerned with imperialism and Russian domestic and foreign problems will welcome this thought-provoking work." -David MacKenzie, American Historical Review "A convincing and important analysis of the mutual dependence of autocratic domestic and foreign politics.... This book ought to be the occasion for a renewed and wide discussion of Russian imperialism and should give rise to further studies of the question." -Alan Kimball, Slavic Review "This is a remarkably good book. Good in many respects-quality of research and writing, breadth of view, command of the facts, balance and penetration in judgment, familiarity with relevant theory.... The book represents a revived and deepened historicism." -Paul W. Schroeder, Journal of Modern History