Sovietization (russian: Советизация) is the adoption of a political system based on the model of

soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

s (workers' councils) or the adoption of a way of life, mentality, and culture modelled after the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

. This often included adopting the

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

Cyrillic script The Cyrillic script ( ), Slavonic script or the Slavic script, is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and Iranic-speaking co ...

, and sometimes also the Russian language. Itself, the term

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

as a form of self-organization that arose during the 1905 Russian Revolution was positive in nature being associated with equality, justice, democracy. However, during the revolutionary period of late 1917 and the Bolshevik coup-d'état, the soviets went through transformation known in history as bolshevization of the Soviets during which

Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...

or "the Reds" became the leading force in this movement of self-organization. Bolshevization of the Soviets led to situation of " Dual power" in the post-Tsarist Russia where "the Reds was fighting the

Contra Contra may refer to: Places * Contra, Virginia * Contra Costa Canal, an aqueduct in the U.S. state of California * Contra Costa County, California * Tenero-Contra, a municipality in the district of Locarno in the canton of Ticino in Switzerland ...

". Since then, the term has been associated exclusively with communism and the Bolsheviks' state of

. A notable wave of Sovietization (in the second meaning) occurred in

Mongolia Mongolia; Mongolian script: , , ; lit. "Mongol Nation" or "State of Mongolia" () is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south. It covers an area of , with a population of just 3.3 million, ...

and later during and after

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

Central Europe Central Europe is an area of Europe between Western Europe and Eastern Europe, based on a common historical, social and cultural identity. The Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) between Catholicism and Protestantism significantly shaped the a ...

(Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland etc.). In a broad sense, this included (voluntary and involuntary) adoption of Soviet-like institutions, laws, customs, traditions, and the Soviet way of life, both on a national level and in smaller communities. This was usually promoted and sped up by propaganda aimed at creating a common way of life in all states within the

Soviet sphere of influence ''Soviet Empire'' is a political term which is used in Sovietology to describe the actions and power of the Soviet Union, with an emphasis on its dominant role in other countries. In the wider sense, the term refers to the country's foreign po ...

. In many cases, Sovietization was also accompanied by forced resettlement of large categories of "

class enemies The term enemy of the people or enemy of the nation, is a designation for the political or class opponents of the subgroup in power within a larger group. The term implies that by opposing the ruling subgroup, the "enemies" in question are ac ...

" (

kulak Kulak (; russian: кула́к, r=kulák, p=kʊˈlak, a=Ru-кулак.ogg; plural: кулаки́, ''kulakí'', 'fist' or 'tight-fisted'), also kurkul () or golchomag (, plural: ), was the term which was used to describe peasants who owned ove ...

s, or ''

osadnik Osadniks ( pl, osadnik/osadnicy, "settler/settlers, colonist/colonists") were veterans of the Polish Army and civilians who were given or sold state land in the ''Kresy'' (current Western Belarus and Western Ukraine) territory ceded to Poland by P ...

s'', for instance) to the

Gulag The Gulag, an acronym for , , "chief administration of the camps". The original name given to the system of camps controlled by the GPU was the Main Administration of Corrective Labor Camps (, )., name=, group= was the government agency in ...

labor camps and exile settlements. In a narrow sense, the term ''Sovietization'' is often applied to mental and social changes within the population of the Soviet Union and its satellites which led to creation of the ''

new Soviet man The New Soviet man or New Soviet person (russian: новый советский человек ''novy sovetsky chelovek''), as postulated by the ideologists of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, was an archetype of a person with specific ...

'' (according to its supporters) or ''

Homo Sovieticus ''Homo Sovieticus'' ( Dog Latin for "Soviet Man") is a pejorative for an average conformist person in the Soviet Union and other countries of the Eastern Bloc. The term was popularized by Soviet writer and sociologist Aleksandr Zinovyev, who ...

'' (according to its critics).

See also

References

Further reading