This comparative analysis of various communist movements across the globe from eminent British historian and political scientist, Hugh Seton-Watson, delves deeply into the social and political states of countries where communists attempted to seize—and successfully seized—power. The author of many of the mid-20th century's standard works on Russian and Eastern European history, Seton-Watson's 1953 study carefully follows the sequence of communist revolution: from the Marxist-Leninist seizure of power in Russia during WWI and its consolidation under Lenin; the rise and horrors of Stalinism in the late 20s, 30s and 40s; the birth of the Comintern and popular front in the inter-war period; the communist inspired/directed resistance movements of the war years; through to the Stalinisation of Eastern Europe in the wake of WWII; the rise and triumph of Mao in China; communist triumphs in Korea and Southeast Asia; and the role of Marxist-Leninist and Stalinist thought in the nationalist/anti-colonialist movements in Africa, Asia and Latin America in the early-mid-20th century. An unmissable addition to your collection! "Both the subject and the literature of communism are vast. Communism is a theory, which professes to explain philosophy, religion, history, economics and society. Communism is a vocation, whose devotees accept its discipline in every part of their private and professional lives. Communism is a science of conspiracy, a technique of wrecking and subversion. Communism is a revolutionary movement, a political force which operates in a social environment, which recruits its members from various classes of society, and marshals its armies against various political opponents."—Hugh Seton-Watson, Introduction