This article examines the ideologically-articulated shifts, and the images of transformation, and nation-building process presented in the new generation of school history textbooks in Russia. The article analyses the new content of post-Soviet history textbooks used in Russian secondary schools that represent various transformations from communism to a western-style democracy. It discusses the resultant issues of searching for a new national identity and citizenship during the present transitional period. It critiques the new versions of Russia's post-Soviet history taught in schools, and evaluates their officially defined status as instruments in the Russian process of ideological transformation and nation-building, currently closely monitored by the State. In other countries, including Australia, these processes are still present but in less formal and more ad hoc ways.