Cigarettes and Soviets: Smoking in the USSR

Cigarettes and Soviets is a comprehensive study of the Soviet tobacco habit, examining how the Soviets maintained the first mass smoking society in the world while simultaneously fighting it. It explores the Soviet antipathy to tobacco, capitulation to the market, development of innovative cessation techniques, late entry into global anti-tobacco work, lack of cultural stimuli, and expansion of smoking without capitalist markets. It also adds a gendered dimension.

Format: Hardback
Length: 324 pages
Publication date: 25 October 2022
Publisher: Cornell University Press

Cigarettes and Soviets: A Comprehensive Examination of the Soviet Tobacco Habit

Tricia Starks delves into the intricate relationship between the Soviets and their tobacco habit, offering a comprehensive study that encompasses both the societal, political, and cultural dimensions of this phenomenon. The book explores how the Soviets managed to establish the world's first mass smoking society while simultaneously combating it.

Starks examines the Soviet government's initial resistance to tobacco, followed by their eventual capitulation to market forces. She explores the development of innovative cessation techniques and clinics, as well as the late entry of the Soviet Union into global anti-tobacco efforts. The book also sheds light on the paradoxical phenomenon of massive tobacco use in a society that lacked conventional stimuli associated with capitalist markets.

Starks delves into various aspects of the Soviet tobacco experience, including the expansion of smoking without the usual prompts of capitalist markets. She tells the story of Philip Morris's Mission to Moscow campaign, which aimed to penetrate the Soviet market and the triumph of the iconic cigarette as a capitalist product within a communist system. The book also examines the successes and failures of the world's first national anti-smoking campaign.

A gendered dimension is added to the analysis through the interplay of male habits and health against largely female tobacco producers and medical professionals. Smoking developed, continued, and grew in the Soviet Union without the mass production, intensive advertising, seductive industrial design, or product ubiquity commonly associated with modern tobacco use.

Cigarettes and Soviets challenges prevailing interpretations of how tobacco use rose in the past and what factors contribute to mass use today. The book provides valuable insights into the complex dynamics of tobacco consumption in different cultural contexts and sheds light on the challenges faced by governments and individuals in combating the tobacco epidemic.

Weight: 28g
Dimension: 229 x 152 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781501765483