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The Cold War: A Global History

Module description

While usually considered as a nearly five-decade rivalry among the two superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States, the Cold War was also a global process involving a range of geographical regions and actors. This course will offer new perspectives on the Cold War, which bring multiple international networks, nations and localities to the front. The module will move beyond political history and will explore various aspects such as science, economy and social movements. Finally, it will consider the limits to what the Cold War paradigm can explain about 20^th century history.

Module aims - intentions of the module

This module will examine new directions in the historiography of the Cold War and the ways in which recent research has changed or confirmed conventional narratives. The course will be structured to reflect a range of perspectives from which the Cold War has been and is currently studied, among them history of science, colonial and post-colonial history, global history, history of everyday life, and cultural history. We will read classic scholarship alongside new approaches to Cold War history, drawing on a wide range of sources from memoirs through propaganda material to science fiction. Through these discussions, we will explore conceptual and methodological questions for writing the global history of the Cold War. We will ask how shifting perspectives away from the US-Soviet binary changes the way we conceptualise the conflict; what a global perspective can reveal about the Cold War’s stakes and the relationship of the two superpowers; how the Cold War evolved as a global conflict; and if the Cold War is the best framework to approach the second half of the 20^th century.

The module will familiarise you with key historiographical debates, and also allow you to engage with primary sources.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Locate and evaluate critically the relevant primary and secondary source materials required to investigate a specific historical or methodological question
• 2. Demonstrate a detailed knowledge of key themes and approaches in the study of the global history of the Cold War

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 3. Demonstrate the ability to analyse and synthesise widely different types of historical material and evidence
• 4. Identify and understand the nature of original sources
• 5. Demonstrate a critical understanding of key historical concepts and debates
• 6. Research for themselves and present independent accounts and interpretations of different historical issues

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 7. Develop the capacity for independent critical study and thought
• 8. Apply key bibliographical skills (including the use of on-line finding aids)
• 9. Construct and defend a sustained argument, both in written form and orally, using primary and secondary materials
• 10. Work as an individual and with a tutor and peers in an independent, constructive and responsive way (e.g. lead a group discussion or task)

Syllabus plan

Exact syllabus may vary year to year but the module will examine topics such as:

• Global History, Transnational History and Understanding the Cold War
• Big Science, Big Weapons
• The Cold War, Decolonisation, Rights and Race
• International Organisations in the Cold War
• The Non-Aligned Movement 
• Transnationalism and Social Movements in the Cold War
• Heated moments in a Cold War: conflicts within and without 
• Iron or nylon curtain? Interactions and mobility between East and West 
• Beyond a divided world: scientific collaboration across the globe
• Capitalist and alternative globalisations: From the New international Economic Order to Globalisation
• When, where and how did the Cold War end?

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Instead of reflecting on the delivery of the presentation and its reception, as in the original assessment, the reflective commentary will explore the objectives and intended delivery methods of the presentation.

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 50%) you will be required to submit a further assessment as necessary. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of referral will be capped at 50%.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

• Sari Autio-Sarasmo and Brendan Humphreys, eds. Winter Kept Us Warm: Cold War Interactions Reconsidered, Aleksanteri Cold War Series. Helsinki: Alexanteri Institute, 2010. 
• Robert J. McMahon, ed. Cold War in the Third World. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.
• Gabrielle Hecht, Entangled Geographies: Empire and Technopolitics in the Global Cold War. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. 
• Hong, Young-sun. Cold War Germany, the Third World and the Global Humanitarian Regime.  New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015. 
• Naomi Oreskes and John Krige, eds. Nation and Knowledge: Science and Technology in the Global Cold War. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2015. 
• Westad, Odd Arne, The Global Cold War. Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.
• Artemy Kalinovsky and Craig Daigle, eds. The Routledge Handbook of the Cold War. London: Routledge, 2014.
• Melvyn P. Leffler and Odd Arne Westad, eds., Cambridge History of the Cold War, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
• Tobias Rupprecht. Soviet Internationalism after Stalin: Interaction and Exchange between the USSR and Latin America During the Cold War. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
• Oscar Sanchez-Sibony, Red Globalisation: The Political Economy of the Soviet Cold War from Stalin to Khrushchev, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014.
• Mark Mazower, Governing the world: the history of an idea, London: Allen Lane, 2013.
• Marcos Cueto, Cold War, Deadly Fevers: Malaria Eradication in Mexico, 1955-1975.  Washington, D.C.; Baltimore: Woodrow Wilson Center Press; Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007.
• Anette Vowinckel, Marcus M. Payk and Thomas Lindenerger, eds. Cold War Cultures. New York: Berghahn, 2012.

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

• ELE – https://vle.exeter.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=11608 

Key words search

Cold War History, Global History, History of Science, History of Technology, Decolonisation, History of Internationalism, Social Movements, Globalisation