When Soviet power collapsed between 1989 and 1991, the overwhelming view in the West was that liberalism had triumphed and that the world could look forward to a period of peace and prosperity underpinned by globalization backed by American power. Today all of that early optimism has faded, to be replaced by a deep fear that the world is once again dividing into two camps very much like the Cold War of old.
How have we arrived at this crossroads? What has caused it? Could it have been avoided? And will, what many are now calling a ‘new’ cold war, be as dangerous and as prolonged as the ‘first’?
Meet our speakers and chair
Barry Buzan is Emeritus Professor of International Relations at LSE (formerly Montague Burton Professor); honorary professor at Copenhagen, Jilin, and China Foreign Affairs Universities; Senior Fellow at LSE IDEAS; and a fellow of the British Academy.
Elizabeth Ingleson (@lizingleson) is Assistant Professor in the Department of International History at LSE, and specialises in the histories of US foreign relations, US-China relations, capitalism, and labor. She is the author of Made in China: When US-China Interests Converged to Transform Global Trade (2024).
Vladislav Zubok is Professor of International History at LSE and Head of the Russia International Affairs Programme at LSE IDEAS. His expertise is on the Cold War, the Soviet Union, Stalinism, and Russia's intellectual history in the 20th century.
Michael Cox is Emeritus Professor of International Relations at LSE. He helped establish the Cold War Studies Centre at LSE in 2004 and later co-founded LSE IDEAS in 2008 with Arne Westad.
More about this event
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