3 - Communism, Eurasianism, and Despotism: The Markers of Soviet Foreign Policy in the 1950s

Summary

Introduction

This chapter examines the markers of foreign policy of the Soviet Union in the 1950s. The Soviet intellectual class contributed to maintaining social control of the citizenry through the projection of a narrative that served to legitimize the power of the ruling elite. Eurasianism was also an instrument that entrenched the geopolitical inf luence of the Soviet Union in Eastern Europe. The cultural rapprochement between the Soviet Union and the countries of the Intermarium was propelled by the need to secure that area of Europe from interference by the Western powers. Eurasianism became an important instrument for harmonizing the political and economic principles that would guide relations among the countries that made up the Soviet bloc. The bureaucratic class also played a role as a bulwark of the managerial system that prevailed in the Soviet Union during the 1950s. The despotic tendencies that emerged from the bureaucratic class were of paramount importance for deploying a scheme of foreign policy that would enable the Soviet Union to keep control over its sphere of inf luence.

The Intellectual Construction of Communism in the 1950s

The Soviet intellectual class disseminated the articles of faith that guided the construction of Soviet society and Moscow's foreign policy in the 1950s. The intellectual class was put in charge of constructing a narrative aimed at legitimizing the Communist system. The task of Soviet intellectuals was informed by the international environment, which was still perceived as being hostile toward the Soviet Union. The Soviet intelligentsia was in charge of projecting a legitimizing narrative in exchange for a living standard that was higher than the rest of the population. Their role was to “perfect” social relations and to create a “new man,” even when this implied the existence of a certain level of dissonance between reality and ideology. The intellectual class was in charge of paying attention “to the ideological and political education of all the people,” which included the members of its own social stratum. This meant that the leading class of the Soviet Union was not the “proletariat” but a small group of people in charge of disciplining society through the projection of narratives that legitimized the power of the Communist Party.