David Engerman, Brandeis University "After Ideology, What? The Rise and Fall of Ideas of Convergence" American views of the Soviet Union in the 1950s and 1960s were not based solely on the notion that the USSR was the west's ideological enemy. Novel theories and techniques across the social sciences called for interpreting it as an industrial society, sharing many common elements with capitalist societies. American analysts generally agreed that the USSR had (in the words of Josif Stalin) "left behind age-old 'Russian backwardness'" to become the newest member of the family of industrial nations. The highest stage of this argument emerged in the 1960s, when leftist critics and conservative scholars alike contemplated a convergence between capitalist and communist societies. Based on the notion that the structure and mechanisms of industrial societies trumped ephemeral ideological and political differences, the idea of convergence hardly won universal support. But the very argument about convergence helps historians map out the complexities of "ideology" in the decade after Daniel Bell wrote its obituary. The exploration of the history of convergence also demonstrates how new interpretations of the USSR relied upon and helped reshape notions of capitalist society.