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THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE

Year 2021, Volume: 39 Issue: 2, 289 - 302, 30.06.2021

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to explore the political economy views of the Soviet elites. It is demonstrated that as the Soviet elite was able to maintain economic stability, the ideological structure was not challenged. In contrast to that, economic stagnation and relative decline of the Soviet Union caused de-legitimization of the conservative elite ideas. Thus, socialism had to be reinterpreted by new elite. To prove the argument, the paper constructs a theoretical framework for ideological elites. The constructed elite theories are applied to the political economic framework of the Soviet elite. The paper concludes that as the existing ideological interpretation becomes dysfunctional, the elite was replaced by another faction in the party. In other words, the Soviet elite sought to solve the economic problems within the party structure itself.

References

  • Bean, J.J. (1997), "Nikolai Bukharin and the New Economic Policy: A Middle Way?", The Independent Review, 2(1), 79–97.
  • Bernholz, P. (2015), "Legitimation, Co-Optation, and Repression in Ideocracies: A rational Choice Perspective", in U. Backes & S. Kailitz (eds.), Ideocracies in Comparison: Legitimation, Cooptation, Repression, London: Routledge, 69-87.
  • Brooker, P. (1995), Twentieth-Century Dictatorships: The Ideological one-Party States, Basingstoke: Macmillan.
  • Brooker, P. (2014), Non-Democratic Regimes (Third edition), Basingstoke, England: Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Brovkin, V. (1982), "The Mensheviks and NEP Society in Russia", Russian History, 9(2/3), 347–377.
  • Burton, M., J. Higley (2001), "The Study of Political Elite Transformations", International Review of Sociology, 11(2), 181–199. https://doi.org/10.1080/713674040
  • Charemza, W.W., J. Kiraly (1990), "Plans and Exogeneity: The Genetic-Teleological Dispute Revisited", Oxford Economic Papers, 42(3), 562–573.
  • Dix, R.H. (1982), "The Breakdown of Authoritarian Regimes", The Western Political Quarterly, 35(4), 554. https://doi.org/10.2307/447341
  • Easter, G. (2000), Reconstructing the State: Personal Networks and Elite Identity in Soviet Russia, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Easterly, W., S. Fischer (1995), The Soviet Economic Decline (World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 1284), Washington, D.C.
  • Gaman-Golutvina, O. (2008), "Changes in Elite Patterns", Europe-Asia Studies, 60(6), 1033–1050. https://doi.org/10.1080/09668130802180967
  • Geddes, B., J. Wright, E. Frantz (2014), "Autocratic Breakdown and Regime Transitions: A New Data Set", Perspectives on Politics, 12(2), 313–331. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1537592714000851
  • Gosplan (1986), USSR in Numbers in 1985, Moscow. Hanley, E., N. Yershova, R. Anderson (1995), "Russia - Old Wine in a New Bottle? The Circulation and Reproduction of Russian Elites,1983-1993", Theory and Society, 24(5), 639–668.
  • Hanson, P. (2003), The Rise and fall of the Soviet Economy: An Economic History of the USSR from 1945, London: Longman.
  • Higley, J., M.G. Burton (2006), Elite Foundations of Liberal Democracy, Lanham, Md., Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
  • Hill, F., C.G. Gaddy, (2003), The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners left Russia out in the Cold, Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press.
  • Kenez, P. (2006), A history of the Soviet Union from the beginning to the end (2nd ed.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Khanin, G. I. (2003), "The 1950s: The Triumph of the Soviet Economy", Europe-Asia Studies, 55(8), 1187–1211.
  • Lenin, V.I. (1919), “Left-Wing” Childishness Retrieved from https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/may/09.htm
  • Lodge, M. (1968), "Soviet Elite Participatory Attitudes in the Post-Stalin Period", American Political Science Review, 62(3), 827–839, https://doi.org/10.2307/1953433
  • Mawdsley, E., S. (White2000), "The Soviet Elite from Lenin to Gorbachev: The Central Committee and its members, 1917-1991", Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • McCauley, M. (2008), "The rise and fall of the Soviet Union", Harlow, England, New York: Longman.
  • Mearsheimer, J.J. (2001), The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, New York, London: W.W. Norton.
  • Moltz, J.C. (1993), "Divergent Learning and the Failed Politics of Soviet Economic Reform", World Politics, 45(2), 301–325. https://doi.org/10.2307/2950661
  • Nove, A. (1992a), An Economic History of the USSR, 1917-1991 (3rd ed.), London: Penguin Books.
  • Nove, A. (1992b), Stalinism and after: The road to Gorbachev, London: Routledge.
  • O’Brien, T. (2016), "Shifting Patterns of Governance in Authoritarian Regimes", Australian Journal of Political Science, 52(2), 303–316. https://doi.org/10.1080/10361146.2017.1300872
  • Ofer, G. (1987), "Soviet Economic Growth: 1928-1985", Journal of Economic Literature, 25(4), 1767–1833.
  • Pakulski, J., J. Higley (1999), "Elite Power Games and Democratic Consolidation in Central and Eastern Europe", The Soviet and Post-Soviet Review, 26(1), 115–137. https://doi.org/10.1163/187633299X00057
  • Prybyla, J.S. (1972), "The Soviet Economy: An Overview", Current History, 63(374), 175–180.
  • Rosefielde, S. (2005), Russia in the 21st century: The Prodigal Superpower, Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press.
  • Sakwa, R. (1999), The Rise and fall of the Soviet Union, 1917-1991, London: Routledge.
  • Service, R. (2003), A history of modern Russia from Nicholas II to Vladimir Putin: From Nicholas II to Putin, Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University Press.
  • Smirnov, S. (2015), "Economic Fluctuations in Russia (from the late 1920s to 2015)", Russian Journal of Economics, 1(2), 130–153, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ruje.2015.11.002
  • Smith, J. (2005), The fall of Soviet Communism 1985-91, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Soest, C. von, J. Grauvoge (2017), "Identity, Procedures and Performance: How Authoritarian Regimes Legitimize their Rule", Contemporary Politics, 23(3), 287–305, https://doi.org/10.1080/13569775.2017.1304319
  • Sutela, P. (1991), Economic Thought and Economic Reform in the Soviet Union (Vol. 5), Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press.
  • Tessendorf, M. (1987), "The Changing Soviet Elite", Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science, 36(4), 32–41, https://doi.org/10.2307/1173831
  • Trotsky, L. (1923), The New Course, Retrieved from https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1923/newcourse/index.htm
  • Trotsky, L. (1928), Crisis in the Right-Center Bloc – I. Retrieved from https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1928/11/crisis1.htm
  • Ulfelder, J. (2016), "Contentious Collective Action and the Breakdown of Authoritarian Regimes", International Political Science Review, 26(3), 311–334, https://doi.org/10.1177/0192512105053786
  • Zweynert, J. (2006), "Economic Ideas and Institutional Change: Evidence from Soviet Economic Debates 1987–1991", Europe-Asia Studies, 58(2), 169–192. https://doi.org/10.1080/09668130500481303

İDEOLOJİK ELİTİN POLİTİK EKONOMİ DÜŞÜNCESİ: SOVYET YÖNETİCİ ELİTİ

Year 2021, Volume: 39 Issue: 2, 289 - 302, 30.06.2021

Abstract

Bu çalışmanın amacı Sovyet elitlerinin politik ekonomi görüşlerini ortaya çıkarmaktır. Çalışmada Sovyet elitlerinin ekonomik istikrarı sağladığı sürece ideolojik yapının sorgulanmadığı gösterilmektedir. Buna karşılık ekonomik durgunluk ve Sovyetler Birliği’nin görece gerilemesi muhafazakâr elit düşüncelerinin meşruiyetinin kaybolmasına yol açmıştır. Dolayısıyla sosyalizm yeni elit tarafından yeniden yorumlanmıştır. Bu argümanı ispatlamak için ideolojik elitlerin teorik yapısı kurulmaktadır. Kurulan elit teorisi Sovyetler Birliğindeki elitlerine uygulanmaktır. Çalışma; mevcut elit ideolojisinin işlevsiz hale gelmesiyle birlikte parti içindeki farklı bir fraksiyonun onun yerini aldığı sonucuna ulaşmaktadır. Bir başka deyişle, Sovyet eliti ekonomik sorunları parti yapısının içinde çözmeye çalışmıştır.

References

  • Bean, J.J. (1997), "Nikolai Bukharin and the New Economic Policy: A Middle Way?", The Independent Review, 2(1), 79–97.
  • Bernholz, P. (2015), "Legitimation, Co-Optation, and Repression in Ideocracies: A rational Choice Perspective", in U. Backes & S. Kailitz (eds.), Ideocracies in Comparison: Legitimation, Cooptation, Repression, London: Routledge, 69-87.
  • Brooker, P. (1995), Twentieth-Century Dictatorships: The Ideological one-Party States, Basingstoke: Macmillan.
  • Brooker, P. (2014), Non-Democratic Regimes (Third edition), Basingstoke, England: Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Brovkin, V. (1982), "The Mensheviks and NEP Society in Russia", Russian History, 9(2/3), 347–377.
  • Burton, M., J. Higley (2001), "The Study of Political Elite Transformations", International Review of Sociology, 11(2), 181–199. https://doi.org/10.1080/713674040
  • Charemza, W.W., J. Kiraly (1990), "Plans and Exogeneity: The Genetic-Teleological Dispute Revisited", Oxford Economic Papers, 42(3), 562–573.
  • Dix, R.H. (1982), "The Breakdown of Authoritarian Regimes", The Western Political Quarterly, 35(4), 554. https://doi.org/10.2307/447341
  • Easter, G. (2000), Reconstructing the State: Personal Networks and Elite Identity in Soviet Russia, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Easterly, W., S. Fischer (1995), The Soviet Economic Decline (World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 1284), Washington, D.C.
  • Gaman-Golutvina, O. (2008), "Changes in Elite Patterns", Europe-Asia Studies, 60(6), 1033–1050. https://doi.org/10.1080/09668130802180967
  • Geddes, B., J. Wright, E. Frantz (2014), "Autocratic Breakdown and Regime Transitions: A New Data Set", Perspectives on Politics, 12(2), 313–331. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1537592714000851
  • Gosplan (1986), USSR in Numbers in 1985, Moscow. Hanley, E., N. Yershova, R. Anderson (1995), "Russia - Old Wine in a New Bottle? The Circulation and Reproduction of Russian Elites,1983-1993", Theory and Society, 24(5), 639–668.
  • Hanson, P. (2003), The Rise and fall of the Soviet Economy: An Economic History of the USSR from 1945, London: Longman.
  • Higley, J., M.G. Burton (2006), Elite Foundations of Liberal Democracy, Lanham, Md., Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
  • Hill, F., C.G. Gaddy, (2003), The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners left Russia out in the Cold, Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press.
  • Kenez, P. (2006), A history of the Soviet Union from the beginning to the end (2nd ed.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Khanin, G. I. (2003), "The 1950s: The Triumph of the Soviet Economy", Europe-Asia Studies, 55(8), 1187–1211.
  • Lenin, V.I. (1919), “Left-Wing” Childishness Retrieved from https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/may/09.htm
  • Lodge, M. (1968), "Soviet Elite Participatory Attitudes in the Post-Stalin Period", American Political Science Review, 62(3), 827–839, https://doi.org/10.2307/1953433
  • Mawdsley, E., S. (White2000), "The Soviet Elite from Lenin to Gorbachev: The Central Committee and its members, 1917-1991", Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • McCauley, M. (2008), "The rise and fall of the Soviet Union", Harlow, England, New York: Longman.
  • Mearsheimer, J.J. (2001), The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, New York, London: W.W. Norton.
  • Moltz, J.C. (1993), "Divergent Learning and the Failed Politics of Soviet Economic Reform", World Politics, 45(2), 301–325. https://doi.org/10.2307/2950661
  • Nove, A. (1992a), An Economic History of the USSR, 1917-1991 (3rd ed.), London: Penguin Books.
  • Nove, A. (1992b), Stalinism and after: The road to Gorbachev, London: Routledge.
  • O’Brien, T. (2016), "Shifting Patterns of Governance in Authoritarian Regimes", Australian Journal of Political Science, 52(2), 303–316. https://doi.org/10.1080/10361146.2017.1300872
  • Ofer, G. (1987), "Soviet Economic Growth: 1928-1985", Journal of Economic Literature, 25(4), 1767–1833.
  • Pakulski, J., J. Higley (1999), "Elite Power Games and Democratic Consolidation in Central and Eastern Europe", The Soviet and Post-Soviet Review, 26(1), 115–137. https://doi.org/10.1163/187633299X00057
  • Prybyla, J.S. (1972), "The Soviet Economy: An Overview", Current History, 63(374), 175–180.
  • Rosefielde, S. (2005), Russia in the 21st century: The Prodigal Superpower, Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press.
  • Sakwa, R. (1999), The Rise and fall of the Soviet Union, 1917-1991, London: Routledge.
  • Service, R. (2003), A history of modern Russia from Nicholas II to Vladimir Putin: From Nicholas II to Putin, Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University Press.
  • Smirnov, S. (2015), "Economic Fluctuations in Russia (from the late 1920s to 2015)", Russian Journal of Economics, 1(2), 130–153, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ruje.2015.11.002
  • Smith, J. (2005), The fall of Soviet Communism 1985-91, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Soest, C. von, J. Grauvoge (2017), "Identity, Procedures and Performance: How Authoritarian Regimes Legitimize their Rule", Contemporary Politics, 23(3), 287–305, https://doi.org/10.1080/13569775.2017.1304319
  • Sutela, P. (1991), Economic Thought and Economic Reform in the Soviet Union (Vol. 5), Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press.
  • Tessendorf, M. (1987), "The Changing Soviet Elite", Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science, 36(4), 32–41, https://doi.org/10.2307/1173831
  • Trotsky, L. (1923), The New Course, Retrieved from https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1923/newcourse/index.htm
  • Trotsky, L. (1928), Crisis in the Right-Center Bloc – I. Retrieved from https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1928/11/crisis1.htm
  • Ulfelder, J. (2016), "Contentious Collective Action and the Breakdown of Authoritarian Regimes", International Political Science Review, 26(3), 311–334, https://doi.org/10.1177/0192512105053786
  • Zweynert, J. (2006), "Economic Ideas and Institutional Change: Evidence from Soviet Economic Debates 1987–1991", Europe-Asia Studies, 58(2), 169–192. https://doi.org/10.1080/09668130500481303
There are 42 citations in total.

Details

Primary Language English
Journal Section Articles
Authors

Mehmet Şahin 0000-0002-0142-6666

Publication Date June 30, 2021
Submission Date September 14, 2020
Published in Issue Year 2021 Volume: 39 Issue: 2

Cite

APA Şahin, M. (2021). THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE. Hacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi Ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi, 39(2), 289-302.
AMA Şahin M. THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE. Hacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi. June 2021;39(2):289-302.
Chicago Şahin, Mehmet. “THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE”. Hacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi Ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi 39, no. 2 (June 2021): 289-302.
EndNote Şahin M (June 1, 2021) THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE. Hacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi 39 2 289–302.
IEEE M. Şahin, “THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE”, Hacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi, vol. 39, no. 2, pp. 289–302, 2021.
ISNAD Şahin, Mehmet. “THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE”. Hacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi 39/2 (June 2021), 289-302.
JAMA Şahin M. THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE. Hacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi. 2021;39:289–302.
MLA Şahin, Mehmet. “THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE”. Hacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi Ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi, vol. 39, no. 2, 2021, pp. 289-02.
Vancouver Şahin M. THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC THOUGHT OF THE IDEOLOGICAL ELITE: THE SOVIET GOVERNING ELITE. Hacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi. 2021;39(2):289-302.

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