Editor's Note

Abstract

This issue of Soviet Studies in History is devoted to recent Soviet advances in American history, specifically to the study of the two-party system by the "Laboratory of Problems in U.S. History" at Moscow State University. In an unusual departure from normal practice, a Soviet colleague has written a special introduction for our readers. Professor Nikolai Vasilevich Sivachev, Head of the Laboratory and one of the leading Soviet Americanists, has described in his essay the activities of the Laboratory as well as the training of specialists in American history at Moscow University. In asking Sivachev to participate in this venture, I felt that a knowledgeable introduction by a Soviet historian would be more valuable than a Western assessment of the articles appearing in translation. To be sure, critical readers will agree with few of the conclusions presented in these works, and with even fewer of the theoretical postulates upon which the Soviet "Marxist-Leninist" interpretation is constructed. Still, the articles contained herein reflect the great strides Soviet historical scholarship on American history has made during the past twenty years, particularly in the utilization of primary sources.