Stephen A. Smith is a historian of modern Russia and China, a Senior Research Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford and a Professor of History in Oxford University. Recent publications include Russia in Revolution: An Empire in Crisis, 1890-1928 (2017). His current research focuses on 'supernatural politics', comparing the ways in which peasants in Soviet Russia (1917-41) and in China (1949-76) used the resources of popular religion and magic to make sense of the turbulent changes that overwhelmed their lives in the course of the Communist revolutions.