"After the Bolshevik Revolution, Russia's new leaders recognized the tantamount importance of teaching science to the masses in order to spread enlightenment and to reinforce the basic tenets of Marxism. However, it was not until the first Five Year Plan and the cultural revolution of 1928-32 that a radical break from Russia's tsarist past was marked. Sadly, after Stalin seized power, enlightenment and science were overwhelmed by ideology and technology as scientists were reduced to serving industry and the propagandistic ends of Stalinism. "In Science for the Masses, James T. Andrews presents a comprehensive history of the early Bolshevik popularization of science in Russia and the former Soviet Union."--Jacket.