Aksel V. Carlsen arbetade som forskare vid Institutet för internationella arbetarrörelsen under de två sista decennierna av den sovjetiska eran. I boken IMRD – min arbejdsplads i Moskva berättar han om kollegor, forskningsprojekt och den komplicerade relationen som institutet hade till den politiska regimen i det auktoritära sovjetsystemet. Ett intrikat nätverk mellan ”sextitalisterna”, som strävade efter socialistiska reformer av systemet, och de toppstyrda rigida politiska maktstrukturerna omgav och definierade IMRD:s verksamhet.

Putins Ryssland är en antologi om den moderna politiska och ekonomiska utvecklingen i landet. Regimens utveckling i alltmer auktoritär riktning och näringslivets oförmåga att ta sig ur en ensidig inriktning på råvaruproduktion är några ämnen som belyses, liksom interaktionen mellan en alltmer offensiv säkerhetspolitik och de ekonomiska sanktionerna från väst som en följd av aggressionen mot stater i det nära utlandet.

What makes a good father? Ideals and practices in late socialist Russia This article investigates fatherhood ideals and practices in late Soviet Russia, 1960–1989. For the theoretical basis, dominant ideals on masculinity and fatherhood have been derived from the rich but predominantly Western research literature of the past three decades. These are used as guiding tools in examining the research material for this study: the monthly magazine Semia i shkola. Zhurnal dlia roditelei (Family and School; Journal for Parents) and eleven in-depth interviews with men in Russia on their memories of fatherhood in the 1960s–1980s. The research questions are: What did the ideal image of fatherhood look like in this period? What remembered practices do respondents communicate in interviews, and how do these relate to dominant public/official ideals of the time? Are there differences in the emphasis on various aspects of fatherhood ideals/practices between public discourses and the accounts given by these men? The interview narratives yield a multifaceted picture, with both coinciding and contradictory representations of the respondents’ ideal images, on the one hand, and remembered practices, on the other. Possible explanations are then discussed. In conclusion, Soviet Russian fatherhood is tentatively contextualized within the framework of research results on Western fatherhood.

Forty-five years ago Nikita Khrushchev visited Sweden. Also, forty-five years ago the epoch in Soviet history that is connected with his name  ended. This book has its origin in contributions to a conference in 2004  called the ‘Peaceful co-existence? Relations between the USSR and Sweden during the Khrushchev era 1953–1964’. The aim of the conference was to present research endeavours undertaken in the field of Soviet foreign policy and relations with the world in the 1990’s and the 2000’s when critical archival documents on Soviet history were made accessible for the scholarly world both inside and outside Russia. Furthermore, the aims of the conference were to discuss central lines of Soviet and Swedish foreign policy and the main events in Soviet-Swedish relations in the years of Khrushchev regime.

The article reviews the book "Democratization and Gender in Contemporary Russia," by Suvi Salmenniemi.