The Transnational World of the Cominternians

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-ix

   PDF

2. Introduction

   • Brigitte Studer

   Pages 1-21

3. The Bolshevik Model

   • Brigitte Studer

   Pages 22-39

4. The New Woman

   • Brigitte Studer

   Pages 40-58

5. In Stalin’s Moscow

   • Brigitte Studer

   Pages 59-72

6. Soviet Party Practices

   • Brigitte Studer

   Pages 73-89

7. Becoming a ‘Real Bolshevik’

   • Brigitte Studer

   Pages 90-107

8. The Party and the Private

   • Brigitte Studer

   Pages 108-125

9. From Comrades to Spies

   • Brigitte Studer

   Pages 126-143

10. Epilogue

    • Brigitte Studer

    Pages 144-150

11. Back Matter

    Pages 151-227

    PDF

The 'Cominternians' who staffed the Communist International in Moscow from its establishment in 1919 to its dissolution in 1943 led transnational lives and formed a cosmopolitan but closed and privileged world. The book tells of their experience in the Soviet Union through the decades of hope and terror.

• Soviet Union
• Communism
• Stalinism
• internationalism
• Comintern
• Bolshevization
• transnationalism
• communism
• Privileg
• terrorism
• Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)

“Studer’s book is exhaustively researched and cogently argued, and shines much-needed light on a category and subculture of communists who for too long have been mostly ignored. … her book should be required reading for specialists in Soviet history and the history of international communism.” (Jay Bergman, English Historical Review, Vol. 132 (556), June, 2017)

“The Transnational World of the Cominternians sounds exotic, offering to serve as a guide to the denizens of another planet. … In The Transnational World of the Cominternians one can see the outlines of a truly alternative history of the twentieth century.” (Padraic Kenney, The American Historical Review, October, 2016)

“This book presents a concentrated and engaging collection of historian Brigitte Studer’s research on international communism and its pivotal centre between the wars … . This book must surely be recommended to anyone interested in the Comintern, and will soon be seen as a standard reference work by both established scholars and future students of international communism and the Comintern.” (Fredrik Petersson, International Review of Social History, Vol. 61, April, 2016)

“Brigitte Studer emphasizes the importance of Soviet autobiographical practices in the lives of international communists. … chapters could easily be assigned to advanced undergraduates as standalone essays. The book provides a brief, accessible, and engaging English-language survey of Studer’s theoretically sophisticated body of work on international communism and Soviet subjectivity.” (Lisa A. Kirschenbaum, Slavic Review, 2016)

• University of Bern, Switzerland

  Brigitte Studer

Brigitte Studer is Professor of Contemporary History at the University of Bern, Switzerland, specialising in the histories of communism, Stalinism and gender. She has published widely on the Comintern, on political and cultural interactions between European communism and the Soviet Union, on gender and communism, and on communist subjectivities.

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