Pablo Martín – författare

In 1982, the First Latin American Workshop on Plasma Physics was held in Cam­ buquira (Brazil). It has been a long way since this first meeting up to the actual one, the VII LA WPP held in Caracas, Venezuela. However, the structure of this first Meeting has remained unchanged. The first week of the workshop is always de­ voted at short courses in the different fields of Plasma Physics, and the presentation of contributed and review papers is carried on during the second week. In relation to the preceding meetings, the emphasis on Plasma Processing was increased and a short course in dusty plasma was introduced too. This area of plasma has become more important every year, even though the research in this field is at incipient stage in Latin-America. However we feel that its importance will increase in future years and we should keep step. A large scope of fields in Plasma Physics has been covered in this meeting, however, several areas were left aside, because the field of Plasma Physics has become so broad that it cannot be covered in such a short period of two weeks.

El siglo XX, parafraseando a Moshe Lewin, fue el «siglo soviético». Si consideramos que 1914 marca el inicio real del siglo, al cortar la Gran Guerra abruptamente con el antiguo régimen decimonónico, y 1991 señala su final con la descomposición de la Unión Soviética, podemos entender fácilmente hasta qué punto el Estado surgido de la Revolución de 1917 -o el desarrollo de la revolución, propiamente dicha- ocupan el centro de lo que se ha dado en denominar el «siglo más corto», en brillante propuesta del historiador húngaro Ivan Bérend, que hizo célebre Eric J. Hobsbawm. Precisamente por ello queda mucho que decir sobre la Revolución rusa de 1917: sobre sus orígenes dentro y fuera del Imperio zarista; su comienzo real en 1905 y su dinámica más allá de la ciudad de Petrogrado y de los líderes bolcheviques; su electrizante expansión por Eurasia; y sobre la visión marxista-leninista, nacionalista rusa o neoliberal anglosajona.