East European Studies: Towards a Map of the Field and Its Needs

Abstract

With this paper the Carl Beck Papers in Russian and East European Studies are launched. Though modest in conception, form, and certainly budget, this series is quite immodest in its goals: to find and distribute in the most effective and timely way possible high quality scholarly papers on topics relating to the Soviet Union and East Europe, drawn from the entire range of the humanities and social science disciplines. The Russian and East European Studies Committee of the University of Pittsburgh's Center for International Studies, in recognizing the need for such a series, also recognized the tasks such a project would entail and did not shrink from them. They therefore deserve a prompt expression of appreciation from the editor as well as the promise that their commitment will be consistently tested in the future. Even this first paper, much less the projected four-peryear, would not have appeared without the resolute efforts, careful attention and staunch support offered by Bob Donnorummo and Rose Krasnopoler of REES and by Burkart Holzner, Director of the University Center for International Studies.