In the second half of the seventeenth century, European philosophers began to regard the enlightenment of ignorant and prejudiced people as a means of reducing persecution and of promoting just and reasonable government. In international affairs, the first dramatic application of this doctrine occurred during the wars of the French Revolution when diplomacy, the traditional form of elite communication, was supplemented by missionary appeals to the common man on the enemy side. Since that time, the technology of communication has greatly improved; ever larger literate masses of the population participate in politics and war; the social homogeneity of the political elites in various nations has been lost, and in the West the ideas of liberty and equality have been drained of their revolutionary power.

In the general election of June 1951, the French Communist Party lost almost 10 per cent of the votes it had obtained in 1946 and, thanks to an electoral system that was designed to reduce its parliamentary representation, almost half of its deputies. These results should not be interpreted as a serious defeat for a party that still holds the allegiance of one-quarter of the French people. Its loss of votes, particularly among peasant and middle-class elements, did not affect its major strongholds in industrial areas and in some agricultural regions. Communism in France remains a major political force in a position to threaten both political stability and capacity for effective military defense. The presence of a strong Communist Party, and to a lesser extent of a Gaullist Party that is in part its by-product, prevents the coalition government from adopting a forceful and constructive policy and giving the French people a sense of effective leadership.

On April 12, 1945, the day of President Roosevelt's death and eighteen days before the Russians took Berlin, American forces crossed the Elbe near Magdeburg, some fifty miles from the German capital. A second bridgehead was established across the Elbe on the 13th. On the following day, a German counterattack forced U.S. units to withdraw from their northern bridgehead, while retaining the one in the south. These elements were ordered to hold in place, and other units arriving at the Elbe were turned toward objectives south and north along the west bank of the river. On May 5, a week before the Russians entered Prague, the Third U.S. Army had advance spearheads inside the Czechoslovak frontiers and, on the day the war ended, General Patton was in a position to send aid to the Czechoslovak capital. Despite the pleas of Czechoslovak leaders in Prague and London, these units were not sent forward.

An eminent French historian once wrote: “Consider the revolutions of the Renaissance: in them you will find all the passions, all the spirit, and all the language of the French Revolution.” With some reservations, one might also say that if one considers the Great French Revolution, one can find in it the passions, the spirit, and the language of the Russian Revolution. This is true to such an extent that it is absolutely necessary for the student of recent Russian history to view it every now and then through the French prism. (The student of the French Revolution, too, may gain new insights if occasionally he analyzes his subject in the light of the Russian experience.) Historical analogy by itself is, of course, only one of the many angles from which he ought to approach his subject; and it may be downright misleading if he merely contents himself with assembling the points of formal resemblance between historical situations. “History is concrete”; and this means, among other things, that every event or situation is unique, regardless of its possible similarity to other events and situations. In drawing any analogy, it is therefore important to know where the analogy ends. I hope that I shall not offend badly against this rule; and I would like to acknowledge my great debt to the eminent French historians whose works on the French Revolution have helped me to gain new insights into the Russian Revolution.

Ten years ago Harcourt, Brace and Company published America's Strategy in World Politics. It was written by Nicholas John Spykman, Professor of International Relations at Yale University from 1928 until his death in 1943, and first director of the Institute of International Studies at Yale. Critics recognized that the book was important, but agreed on little else. One reviewer hailed it as “brilliant, incisive, provocative, well-reasoned, well-written, and altogether admirable as an analysis of American foreign policy from a point of view all too long neglected in the United States.” On the other hand, a second reviewer bitterly asked, “What were those eminent scholars at Yale thinking about when they let such an idea loose [that the United States might need German and Japanese power after the war]? … Such guessing and surmising is not objective political science, it is not anything but the expression of mental discomfort that the learned gentleman feels in a world that, despite his own cold-blooded cult of political realism, does not appear to be moving in the direction suggested by his own wishful thinking.” And there was more, much more, both pro and con. Despite a laudatory, front-page review, complete with picture, in the New York Times Book Review, Professor Spykman probably, if the score were totaled, did no better than break even.

Although the term “imperialism” is gaining currency at present, social scientists in the English-speaking world continue to treat with slight interest the phenomena which the term seeks to identify. The authors of the two books under review are of continental European origin. This is hardly an unusual coincidence; the paucity of Anglo-American literature on imperialism contrasts oddly with the prolific stream of writings which has appeared in continental Europe during the last seventy years. One reason for this striking difference lies no doubt in the traditional reluctance of Anglo-American social scientists to generalize about the causation of historical events—and, without such generalization, no theory of imperialism is possible. There is a good deal to be said both for this unwillingness to generalize readily, and against the irrepressible enthusiasm with which European savants construct their sweeping theories. Yet neither can it be denied that the European tradition has produced theories of outstanding and abiding value for the understanding of social and political events. Both Marx and Freud, and many lesser lights, were of this tradition and one need not be Marxist or Freudian to appreciate how immensely their brilliant theories have enriched the social sciences in the Englishspeaking countries.

The formation of attitudes and expectations in international politics—if they are to be adequate bases for action—must rest upon, among other things, a correct appraisal of the motives of the leaders of other countries and of the means by which they achieve their objectives. In a recent article in World Politics entitled “Science and Politics in the U.S.S.R.: The Genetics Debate,” Miss Pamela N. Wrinch discusses the possible ideological motives (as well as, speculatively, some of the psychological ones) which give impetus to the eradication of disapproved scientific theories and procedures, and the argumentative means employed in this stamping-out process. Though the article is fully convincing in presenting a clear picture of Soviet debating techniques, Miss Wrinch is less successful on the score of assessing the motives for the official opposition to certain theories in Soviet Russia.