The Red Flag

Communism was one of the most powerful political and intellectual movements of the modern world; at the height of their influence Communist regimes controlled more than a third of the earth's surface. Given its rapid rise and extensive reach, its sudden and wholly unpredicted collapse after 1989 seems all the more astonishing and in

need of explanation.

In The Red Flag, David Priestland tells the extraordinary story of a movement that took hold in many societies and countries throughout the world. He examines the ideas and motives of its principal thinkers and leaders:from Marx to Mao, and from Stalin to Che Guevara. Priestland asks what it was about Communism that inspired not only its leaders but also the rank and file -whether the militants of 1920s Russia, the guerrilla fighters of China, or the Marxist students of Ethiopia. And he explores the experience of what it meant to live under Communism for its millions of subjects.

The Red Flag looks at Communist regimes'...