Mark Sandleis aprincipal lecturer in Russian and Soviet History at De Montford university. He recently won an award as a DMY Distinguished Teacher (for which he was nominated by his students). He is fascinated by ideas and their impact and loves looking at the broad sweep of history and finding patterns to help people make sense of the past. His previous publications include A Short History of Soviet Socialism(1999) and Brezhnev Reconsidered (2002).