USSR
The USSR was one of the world’s two imperialist superpowers from the end of WW2 in 1945 to its collapse in 1991. As a socialist whose political education was in a broadly Cliffite tradition, I would not describe the USSR as a socialist society at all, given it lacked pretty much all the key criteria of socialism such as “democracy” and “there being no state because it withered away” and “having no class distinctions”. Instead I would view the Soviet Union as a state capitalist society, one which was engaged in militaristic competition with the West, and acted as a colonial power in regions on the country’s periphery, like Kazakhstan. This despite the genuineness of the original Russian Revolution – basically I would see that as having been defeated by counterrevolution, like so many other revolutions before and afterwards.
Wiki
- : 🪴 Mikhail Gorbachev: Mikhail Gorbachev (1931–2022) was the final leader of the USSR, before its collapse in 1991. He was beloved by the …
- : 🪴 Boris Yeltsin: Boris Yeltsin was President of Russia between July 1991 and the end of 1999 – initially with Russia still being a …
- : 🪴 collapse of the USSR: The collapse of the USSR took place in fairly dramatic fashion over the course of 1989–1991, following attempts by …
- : 🪴 Semipalatinsk Test Site (“The Polygon”): Between 1949 and 1991, this was the main place where the Soviet Union tested their nuclear weapons. The test site itself …
Book Reviews
- : 📚 Book review: The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov (★½)
- : 📚 Book review: The Dead Wander in the Desert by Rollan Seisenbayev (★★★★½)
Jessica Smith is a socialist and a feminist who loves animals, books, gaming, and cooking; she’s also interested in linguistics, history, technology and society.