ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book offers material on many aspects of the nationalities question, aims to include diverse scholarly views that have enduring relevance, and seeks to impart a sense of the major issues and conflicts in academic debates concerning the Soviet nationalities. It provides a historical overview of the emergence of the Soviet Union and introduces the main concepts of Leninist and Stalinist ideology that guided later policy. The book outlines the development of Soviet federalism and suggests the particular problems federalism faces in a multinational socialist state. It devotes to pre-Mikhail Gorbachev nationalities problems in order to define the context in which the USSR's nationalities crisis has unfolded. The book evaluates the extent to which nationalism threatened the stability of the Soviet regimes prior to Gorbachev and discusses the nationalist movements that brought about the Soviet Union's federal crisis.
