The 20th century began with a deep identity crisis of European parliamentarianism pluralism
rationalism individualism and liberalism and a following political revolt against the West's
emerging open societies and their ideational foundation. In its radicalism this upheaval
against Western values had far-reaching consequences across the world the repercussions of
which can still be felt today. Germany and Russia formed the center of this insurrection
against those ideas and approaches usually associated with the West.Leonid Luks' essays deal
with the various causes and results of these Russian and German anti-Western revolts for
20th-century Europe. The book also touches upon the development of the peculiar post-Soviet
Russian regime that after the collapse of the USSR emerged on the ruins of the Bolshevik
state that had been established in 1917. What were the determinants of the erosion of the
second Russian democracy that was briefly established after the disempowerment of the CPSU in
August 1991 until the rise of Vladimir Putin?Further foci of this wide-ranging study include
the specific 'geopolitical trap' in which Poland-constrained by its two powerful neighbors-was
caught for centuries. Finally Luks explores the special relationship that all three countries
of Central and Eastern Europe's 'fateful triangle' had with Judaism and the Jews.
