The papers brought together in this volume represent a decade of advances in the historical political economy of defence, dictatorship, and warfare. They address defining events and institutions of the world in the twentieth century: economic consequences of repression and violence, the outcomes...

We review some “myths” of the Great War of 1914 to 1918: that the war broke out inadvertently, that the western front saw needless slaughter, that the Allies used the food weapon to strangle Germany, and that the peace treaty that ended the war caused the rise of Hitler and the still greater...

This paper describes the main trends of the Russian economy through the Great War (1914 to 1917), Civil War (1918 to 1921), and postwar famine (1921 to 1922) for the general reader. During its Great War mobilization the Russian economy declined, but no more than other continental economies under...

The nineteenth century witnessed the triumph of capitalism; the twentieth century saw the bloodiest wars in history. Is there a connection? The paper reviews the literature and evidence. It considers first whether capitalism has lowered the cost of war; then, whether capitalism has shown a...