Britain at the Crossroads of History (Review of Monograph: Khakhalkina E.V. Great Britain and the Problems of Integration, Security and Decolonization in the Second Half of the 1940s and Early 1960s. — Tomsk: Tomsk State University Press, 2017. — 384 p.)

Abstract

The review gives a description of Russian and foreign historiography on British research and analyzes the latest work on the history of Great Britain - a monograph by the Tomsk researcher E.V. Khakhalkina. In the text, the novelty of this work is analyzed in comparison with the publications of its predecessors, the originality of the idea and the validity of the application of the problem-chronological principle of the material presentation are estimated. The author, when analyzing the evolution of the British foreign policy and colonial course, shows the complex fusion and continuity of different challenges of the time, including integration, decolonization and security issues (it is these three directions that are put in the title of the work). Exploring the complex intricacies of various events, the author appeals to documentary archival materials enriching already existing ideas about the general logic of developing the foreign policy course of the United Kingdom during the reign of Laborites and Conservatives in 1945-1964. According to the authors of the review, this book proves that the origins of modern challenges faced not only by the UK but also by other countries are directly related to those processes that were spread after the Second World War in the conditions of the collapse of the world colonial systems and beginning of the European integration.