A Macrohistory of the Communist World: The Making and Unmaking of a Revolutionary Ideal

Contents

Acknowledgment
Preface by Prof. Ming Chu-cheng
Author’s Preface

PART I The Formation of the Communist World (Pre-1917)

Chapter 1 From Utopia to The Wealth of Nations
Chapter 2 Karl Marx and Europe’s Socialist Workers’ Movements
Chapter 3 Lenin and Russia’s February and October Revolutions

PART II The Expansion of the Communist World (1917-1953)

Chapter 4 From Lenin’s One-Party Rule to Stalin’s Great Purges
Chapter 5 The Birth and Development of the Chinese Communist Party with Soviet Support
Chapter 6 From World War II to the Establishment of Communist Regimes in Eastern Europe and China1
Chapter 7 The Expansion of Communist Forces in East and Southeast Asia after the Founding of the PRC

PART III The Split and Continuing Expansion of the Communist World (1953-1978)

Chapter 8 From Khrushchev’s De-Stalinization to Mao’s Great Leap Forward and the Great Famine
Chapter 9 The Vietnam War and the Cultural Revolution
Chapter 10 The Soviet Union and Eastern Europe under Brezhnev’s Rule
Chapter 11 The Continuing Expansions of Communist Forces in East and Southeast Asia
Chapter 12 The US-Soviet Rivalry in Latin America, Africa, and the Islamic World

PART IV The Disintegration of the Communist World (1978-1991)

Chapter 13 Deng Xiaoping’s and Gorbachev’s Roads to Reform
Chapter 14 Approaching Storms: The Turmoil of Soviet Reforms and the June Fourth Incident in China
Chapter 15 Democratic Revolutions in Eastern Europe, and the Dissolution of the Soviet Union

PART V The Communist World After Its Disintegration (1989-2025)

Chapter 16 The Eastern European Countries After 1989
Chapter 17 Russia, Ukraine, and the Other Soviet Union Republics After 1991
Chapter 18 China Post 1989: From the “Rise of a Great Power” to a New Cold War
Chapter 19 The Decline of Communism in the Third World

Afterword The Past, Present, and Future of the Communist World
Appendix 1 Table of Events
Appendix 2 Abbreviations
Bibliograghy
Index

About the Author:
呂正理，生於臺灣桃園大溪，清華大學化學系及化學研究所畢業；曾任跨國企業英商卜內門化學公司台灣分公司（ICI Taiwan）總經理及中國卜內門化學公司 （ICI China）董事總經理。1999年後從事企業顧問工作，業餘研究歷史，現專事寫作。
2010年出版第一本著作《另眼看歷史──一部有關中、日、韓、台灣及周邊世界的多角互動歷史》，榮獲2011年台北國際書展大獎；2015年，該書以《東亞大歷史》為名出簡體版；2016年，改以《另眼看歷史──中、日、韓、台三千年》為名出修訂版；同年，出版第二本著作《從困境中奮起 ──另眼看1945年後的東亞史》，以接續前書。2020年，出版第三本著作《共產世界大歷史：一部有關共產主義及共產黨兩百年的興衰史》；本書為因應近年國際局勢急遽變化而改寫的增訂新修版。前後三本著作同屬「另眼看歷史」系列作品。

C L Lu (呂正理), born in 1950, earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in chemistry from Taiwan’s National Tsinghua University. He served as a senior executive in Taiwan and China at ICI, a multinational chemical company, later becoming a business consultant to clients operating in Taiwan, China, and Southeast Asia. His passion, nevertheless, has always been for history.
His first book, History from a Different Perspective: A Polygonal-Interacting History of China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan and the Surrounding World, won the 2011 Taipei International Book Exhibition Award. In 2015, a simplified Chinese version of the book was published in Beijing under a different title: A Macrohistory of East Asia. In 2020, he published A Macrohistory of the Communist World: The Rise and Fall of Communism and Communist Parties. An updated and revised edition, A Macrohistory of the Communist World: The Making and Unmaking of a Revolutionary Ideal, was published in 2025. This book is the English version of the 2025 edition; it is the first of his works to be translated into English.

About the Translators:
Tim Smith (史天慕) is a long-time Taiwan resident and translator with an M.A. in Translation and Interpretation Studies from NTNU. His interests are in Taiwan literature and Taiwanese Indigenous, Chinese, Japanese, Taiwanese and Hakka languages, literatures, linguistics and folklore. He is also the translator of Banana King Ngôo Tsín-suī (《蕉王吳振瑞》) by author Lee Wang-tai (李旺台), longlisted for the 2025 PEN America Literary Awards Translation Prize.
Michael Nakhiengchanh has a bachelor’s in history from UT Dallas and a master’s in translation from National Taiwan Normal University. His thesis centered on Taiwan independence fighter Su Beng (史明). With five years of translation experience, he has worked on projects including games, novels, and children’s books. His work focuses on shining new light on Taiwan through its past.

About the Editor:
Ian Maxwell holds a bachelor’s degree in English Literature with Creative Writing from Lancaster University. Since 2016, he has lived and worked in Taipei.