Science and the Cold War

What is it about?

This paper explores the origins of British geographical studies of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, in particular the ways in which this sub-discipline was shaped by state-led initiatives after the Second World War, emerging as a small yet distinct area of geographical practice within UK universities. The historical focus of the paper incorporates the publication of the government-initiated Scarbrough Commission Report in 1947 and the formalisation of cultural relations between the UK and the Soviet Union during the 1960s, in addition to such key initiatives as the Joint Services School for Linguists, the early work of the British Council’s Soviet Relations Committee and the 1961 Hayter Report. The paper draws from a range of sources including archival mate- rials and oral history testimonies. It is argued that in addition to a steady stream of more or less standard regional textbooks, the published outputs associated with the sub-discipline post-1945 also comprised a range of systematically focused, as well as more strategically oriented, works. Such studies may put into question any straightforward distinction between traditional regional geography and emergent spatial science.

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