Rebellious Satellite: Poland 1956
Book Discussion with Author Pawel Machcewicz

Friday, October 9th, 2009
12:30 p.m. to 1:30 p.m.
4th Floor Conference Room
Woodrow Wilson Center

In Rebellious Satellite: Poland 1956, Pawel Machcewicz focuses on the people's expression of grievances, and even riots—as opposed to "top-level" activities such as internal Communist Party struggles. The book offers a social history of the mass movements that prompted political change and altered Polish-Soviet relations in 1956 but avoided a Soviet armed response. In his presentation, the author will discuss the protests that took place in Poznan in June 1956 and across Poland the following October and November. Joining Machcewicz will be Charles Gati professor of Russian and Eurasian Studies at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University.

Pawel Machcewicz is a professor of history at the University of Warsaw. He has also taught at the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun and holds an affiliation with the Institute of Political Studies in Warsaw. He was recently named the Polish Prime Minister's personal representative for the creation of a new World War II Museum in Gdansk. Machcewicz is the author of Rebellious Satellite: Poland 1956 (2009) and a former Cold War International History Project Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

Charles Gati is a professor of Russian and Eurasian Studies and a Foreign Policy Institute fellow at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. He has also taught at Union College and Columbia University and has served as a senior member of the Policy Planning Staff of the U.S. Department of State. Gati is the author of several monographs including Failed Illusions: Moscow, Washington, Budapest and the 1956 Hungarian Revolt (2006) and Hungary and the Soviet Bloc (1986), both of which have received the Marshall Shulman Prize for outstanding book on the international relations of the former Soviet bloc.