Speaks-Warnock Lecture: "To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause: The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement"

Half a century ago, the Soviet Union found itself unexpectedly challenged by a group of Soviet citizens who achieved global fame in the longest battle of the Cold War—the battle of ideas. The struggle of Soviet dissidents for the rule of law and human rights made them instant heroes in the West as they pursued the goal of containment of Soviet power from within. Rather than see dissidents as surrogate soldiers of democracy and liberalism beyond the iron curtain, historian Benjamin Nathans begins with the idea that dissidents were Soviet people. They did something, as one of them put it, “simple to the point of genius: in an unfree country, they began to conduct themselves like free people.” This was the dissident story inside the drama of Soviet history, and not surprisingly, it turned out to be anything but simple.

Dr. Nathans’ most recent book, To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause: The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement, was awarded the 2025 Pulitzer Prize in general non-fiction and the Pushkin House (London) Book Prize, among other awards. He contributes regularly to the New York Review of Books, the Times Literary Supplement, and other periodicals.

This event is free and open to the public.