Introduction / Dominic Lieven
The coming of the Slavs and the origins of Russia
From the arrival of Christianity to the golden age of Kiev
The decline and fall of Kievan Rus
The Tatar invasions and the Mongol yoke
The development of Christianity in Russia
Petrine Russia : centralization and westernization
Russia after Peter : the rule of the empresses
Russia as a great power, 1800
Nicholas I and the Crimean War
The Alexanders : reform and reaction
Russian foreign policy : China and Japan
Imperial expansion : Caucasus
Poles, Finns, and anti-Semitism
Intellectuals and revolutionaries in nineteenth-century Russia
Economic development and its effects
Political upheaval, 1905-1906
The February Revolution and provisional government
From Red October to Brest-Litovsk : the consolidation of Bolshevik power
The aftermath : from war Communism to NEP and the creation of a police state
Stalin's collectivization
Khrushchev : de-Stalinization, thaw, and reform
Russia in Eastern Europe : disintegrating empire
The Cold War : defending the Soviet Union
Soviet intellectuals, dissent, and Samizdat culture
Interregnum : Andropov, early Perestroika, and Chernenko
Gorbachev : from reform to failure
Nationalities and the near abroad
Russia, NATO, and the new European order