Consider key foreign policy challenges and security issues facing post-communist Eastern European countries from the perspective of their respective NATO and EU memberships. Examine contemporary policy debates regarding a resurgent Russian, Chinese foreign policy outreach, and non-state actors, as well as challenges and concerns on terrorism, extremism, and ethnic, religious, and political radicalization.

Explore the causes, and the patterns and modes of mobilization, of protest and regime change in Eastern Europe from the 1956 Hungarian Revolution to the 2014 Ukrainian revolution. Examine and compare the specific national roots of discontent, the mechanics of mass mobilization, and the patterns of democratic uprisings, as well as the responses of national elites and external actors, in the context of these countries' socialist and post-socialist pathways.

Explore the complicated nature of communist rule in Eastern Europe in its many forms, from Poland in the North to Yugoslavia in the South. Examine the variety of lived experiences of citizens of Eastern Europe, from the imposition of communism in the region after World War II to the collapse of the system in 1989. Discuss the most recent scholarship on the region that ties regional developments to the broader Cold War context, and covers issues ranging from state-society dynamics, to religion, consumer culture, urban change, and collectivization.