The Cold War: lessons and legacies

The collapse of European communism two decades ago appeared to determine, once and for all, the fate of radical socialism in the modern world and to draw a line under the forty years of Cold War that had now ended. In an overview of both the course and end of this global confrontation, and of the legacy of communism itself, this article argues that many of the analytical and social dimensions of the Cold War have still to be adequately addressed, and that, while traditional Marxism has indeed been discredited, the need for critical and, where pertinent, utopian thinking remains as relevant as ever.