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Leffler
Photo by Sean Gallagher

Edward Stettinius Professor of History Melvyn Leffler is one of the world’s leading scholars of modern American foreign policy (and former dean of the College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences). For the Soul of Mankind: The United States, the Soviet Union, and the Cold War (Hill & Wang, 2007), his third book on the Cold War, appeared last fall and embraces a new approach to understanding why the Cold War continued for decades and why it finally ended. For the Soul of Mankind has been called particularly timely as well, as it illuminates how rigid world views can inhibit the ability of nations to coexist peacefully.

The book was extensively reviewed by foreign-policy experts worldwide, so for this special A&S Online devoted to Russia, we decided to let the experts weigh in on Leffler’s new work, beginning with G. John Ikenberry, professor of politics and international affairs, Princeton University, in the November/December issue of Foreign Affairs. Ikenberry calls For the Soul of Mankind “a masterful account of the Cold War by a distinguished historian in full stride.” Read the story in Foreign Affairs.

In its coverage, The Economist discussed the relevance of Professor Leffler’s ideas about the Cold War to today’s international relations:

A History of Lost Opportunities
With more than a year to go before the election, America’s presidential campaign is entering a decisive phase. Numerous states have moved up the dates of the crucial first round — the party primaries and caucuses — to the very start of 2008. To the campaign teams, it is unnervingly clear that a painful culling of candidates will take place soon. Would-be presidents are therefore searching for ways to raise their profile, partly by publicising their visions of how America will interact with the world in the post-Bush era.
Into this mix arrives a highly relevant and much-needed historical study by one of the world’s senior scholars of American foreign policy, Melvyn Leffler, a professor at the University of Virginia. For the Soul of Mankind assesses both what went wrong and what went right in America’s diplomatic, military and political interactions with the Soviet Union during the thermonuclear stand-off of the cold war. The title, which Mr. Leffler has taken from a remark by George Bush senior, shows how significant the author considers this subject to be. This is one of the best books on the period to have been written.
Mr. Leffler focuses loosely on several moments of tension between the American and Soviet leaders. They include the Truman-Stalin contest over occupied Germany, culminating in the Berlin airlift of 1948–49, the Cuban missile crisis in 1962 and the tussle between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev over America’s “star wars” missile-shield programme in 1986. Mr. Leffler sees his book as “a history of lost opportunities” when the cold war could plausibly have taken another course.

Read the full story in The Economist.

Watch Professor Leffler discuss For the Soul of Mankind at the Miller Center.

Listen to John J. Miller of National Review Online Radio interview Professor Leffler about the book.