The evolution of the idea of world revolution in Soviet politics (the rise and collapse of the world socialist system)

Abstract

Turning socialism into a system on a global scale was the Soviet Union’s highest point for policy of a revolutionary renewal of the world. By the mid 1950s the ever mounting difficulties compelled the Soviet leadership to make a turn toward normalcy; i.e. to acquiesce to a partial scrapping of some of their revolutionary doctrines and moving on to a policy of peaceful co-existence with capitalism. Yet, the spiraling of the world-wide socialist system into crisis was picking up. There occurred some loosening of the hegemony of the Soviet Communist Party accompanied by a drastic politico-ideological polarization within the world communist movement. In fact, the course on advancing the world revolutionary process and simultaneously the policy of peaceful co-existence were clashing with each other constantly. By the mid 1980s the race against capitalism had been lost, whereas the effects of western soft power had been steadily growing. Perestroika and glasnost helped free the minds of the masses but did not resolve the crisis of the Soviet system. This opened the way to a series of bourgeois revolutions and the disintegration of the USSR and of the world socialist system.