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Feudal America
"Uses a feudal model to analyze contemporary American society, comparing its essential characteristics to those of medieval European societies"--Provided by publisher.
A Normal Totalitarian Society
This study analyzes the ordinary functioning of the Soviet system from Stalin's death through the Soviet collapse and Russia's first post-Soviet decade. Without overlooking the USSR's repressive character, the author treats it as a "normal" system that employed socialist and nationalist ideologies.
Soviet Intellectuals and Political Power
In this unprecedented work on the status and role of intellectuals in Soviet political life, a former Soviet sociologist maps out the delicate, often paradoxical, ties between the political regime and the creative thinkers who play a major part in the movement toward modernization. Beginning with Stalin, Vladimir Shlapentokh explores the mutual need and antagonism that have existed between political leaders and intellectuals. What emerges is a fascinating portrayal of the Soviet intellectual network since the 1950s, which touches on such topics as the role of literature and film in political opposition, levels of opposition (open, legal, and private), and the spread of paranoia as fueled by ...
Freedom, Repression, and Private Property in Russia
This study demonstrates how the emergence of private property and a market economy after the Soviet Union's collapse enabled a degree of freedom while simultaneously supporting authoritarianism. Based on case studies, Vladimir Shlapentokh and Anna Arutunyan analyze how private property and free markets spawn feudal elements in society. These elements are so strong in post-Communist Russia that they prevent the formation of a true democratic society, while making it impossible to return to totalitarianism. The authors describe the resulting Russian society as having three types of social organization: authoritarian, feudal and liberal. The authors examine the adaptation of Soviet-era institutions like security forces, the police and the army to free market conditions and how they generated corruption; the belief that the KGB was relatively free from corruption; how large property holdings merge with power and necessitate repression; and how property relations affect government management and suppression.
Public and Private Life of the Soviet People
From the late 1950s to the early 1980s, the Soviet people's acceptance of official state ideology was gradually replaced by an emphasis on the family and the individual. Perhaps one of the most important social, economic, and political processes to occur in modern Soviet society, privatization has caused people to withdraw their time, energy, and emotion from state controlled activities, investing them instead in family and friendship. Utilizing novels, films, and his own surveys done in the Soviet Union, the author, an emigre sociologist, analyzes the evolution of attitudes toward family and friendship and the emergence and development of civil society as a sphere of interaction not directed by the state. Finally, Shlapentokh examines Gorbachev's reforms as an attempt by the political elite to restore the authority of the state and the prestige of official public activity as well as to exploit some elements of privatization in the interests of the state. A gripping and revealing account of an aspect of Soviet society usually hidden from Westerners, this book will attract a broad audience.
Soviet Cinematography, 1918-1991
With a historical sweep that recent events have made definitive, the authors examine the influence of Soviet ideology on the presentation of social reality in films produced in the Soviet Union between the October Revolution and the final days of glasnost. Within the framework of an introduction that lays out the conceptual terminology used to describe that shifting ideological landscape, the authors analyze both the social groups appearing in the films and the relations of film directors and other film makers to state censorship and ideological control.
The New Russian Diaspora
In the wake of the USSR's collapse, more than 25 million Russians found themselves living outside Russian territory, their status ambiguous. Equally uncertain is the role they will play as a factor in Russian politics, local politics and relations among the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union. This volume, prepared under the sponsorship of the Kennan Institute, offers a comprehensive and amply documented examination of these issues.
Contemporary Russia as a Feudal Society
The book offers a theoretical discussion of the feudal model and a preliminary application of the model to post-Soviet Russia. In addition to a review of the feudal model as an ideal type, the author explains the analytical benefits of drawing comparisons between countries and across historical contexts. Specifically, contemporary Russia is compared to Western European countries during the Middle Ages and to the Soviet period in Russian history. The book is devoted to illuminating the most important political, social and economic characteristics of contemporary Russian society.
State Organized Terror
This book, an outcome of an international conference entitled "State Organized Terror: The Case of Violent Internal Repression", addresses the antecedent structural factors conducive to state organized terror and provides insights into the political and social psychology of state terror.
Restricting Freedoms
Today, freedom is so closely associated with the United States that most people still view America as the ultimate symbol of freedom. This is one reason why the desire to immigrate to the United States from almost anywhere in the world has not waned for more than a century. Because of this image, the idea that Americans are constrained by restrictive ordinances and rules seems contrary and therefore difficult for most citizens to accept.Vladimir Shlapentokh and Eric Beasley argue that the idea of basing American society upon unadulterated freedom in all spheres of life is both unrealistic and simplistic. The authors define freedom as the ability to choose one of many available alternatives. ...
