Communism Unwrapped: Consumption in Cold War Eastern Europe

by Paulina Bren (Editor), Mary Neuburger (Editor), Kate Brown (Contributor)

Communism Unwrapped reveals the complex world of consumption in Cold War Eastern Europe, exploring the ways people shopped, ate, drank, smoked, cooked, acquired, assessed and exchanged goods. These everyday experiences, the editors and contributors argue, were central to the way that communism was lived in its widely varied contexts in the region. From design, to production, to retail sales and black market exchange, Communism Unwrapped follows communist goods from producer to consumer, tracing their circuitous routes. In the communist world this journey was rife with its own meanings, shaped by the special political and social circumstances of these societies. In examining consumption behind the Iron Curtain, this volume brings dimension and nuance to understandings of the communist period and the history of consumerism.

Genres: History

430 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2012

Reviews

[Anna]

Reading this book straight through is probably not the best approach -- by the end I was a little weary of reading about consumption, and a lot of the work in the book feels repetitive, though applicable to different parts of the communist world.

Standout chapters (or at least my favorites) were: chapter 1 on Tuzex stores in Czechoslovakia (Paulina Bren), chapter 4 on Bulgarian tobacco (Mary Neuburger), chapter 8 on the coffee trade in East Germany (Katherine Pence), and chapter 15 on trader tourism between East Germany and Poland (Mark Keck-Szajbel).