Real socialism, better known as actually existing socialism was an ideological catchphrase popularized during the

Brezhnev Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev (19 December 190610 November 1982) was a Soviet politician who served as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1964 until his death in 1982 as well as the fourth chairman of the Presidium ...

era in the

Eastern Bloc The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc (Combloc), the Socialist Bloc, the Workers Bloc, and the Soviet Bloc, was an unofficial coalition of communist states of Central and Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America that were a ...

countries and the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

. The term referred to the

Soviet-type economic planning Soviet-type economic planning (STP) is the specific model of Planned economy#Central planning, centralized planning employed by Marxism–Leninism, Marxist–Leninist socialist states modeled on the economy of the Soviet Union. The post-''pere ...

implemented by the

at that particular time. From the 1960s onward,

Communist state A communist state, also known as a Marxist–Leninist state, is a one-party state in which the totality of the power belongs to a party adhering to some form of Marxism–Leninism, a branch of the communist ideology. Marxism–Leninism was ...

s such as

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

East Germany East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from Foundation of East Germany, its formation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on ...

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...

, and

Yugoslavia , common_name = Yugoslavia , life_span = 1918–19921941–1945: World War II in Yugoslavia#Axis invasion and dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Axis occupation , p1 = Kingdom of SerbiaSerbia , flag_p ...

began to argue that their policies represented what was realistically feasible given their level of productivity. The concept of real socialism alluded to a highly developed socialist system in the future. The actual party claims of nomenclatory socialism began to acquire not only negative, but also sarcastic meanings. In later years and especially after the

dissolution of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Declaration No. 142-Н of ...

, the term began to be remembered as only one thing, i.e. as a reference for Soviet-style socialism. Comeconexecutivecommittee

Definition

After

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, the terms "real socialism" or "really existing socialism" gradually became the predominating euphemisms used as self-description of the

states' political and economical systems and their society models. ''De jure'' often referred to as "people's republics", these states were ruled by a communist party, some of which were ruled autocratically and had adapted a form of

planned economy A planned economy is a type of economic system where investment, production and the allocation of capital goods takes place according to economy-wide economic plans and production plans. A planned economy may use centralized, decentralized, ...

and propagated socialism and/or

communism Communism () is a political sociology, sociopolitical, political philosophy, philosophical, and economic ideology, economic ideology within the history of socialism, socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a ...

as their ideology. The term "real (-ly existing) socialism" was introduced to explain the obvious gap between the propagated ideological framework and the political and economical reality faced by these states' societies. As US Communist Party activist

Irwin Silber Irwin Silber (October 17, 1925 – September 8, 2010) was an American Communism, Communist, Editing, editor, publisher, and activism, political activist. He edited the folk music magazine ''Sing Out!'' and was active in far-left politics througho ...

put it in 1994,

The term 'actually existing socialism’ is not (despite the quotation marks) a sarcasm; in fact, while obviously containing an implicit irony, the phrase itself was coined by Soviet Marxist-Leninists and was widely used by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) and its supporters in polemics with those who postulated a model of socialism significantly different from the system developed in the Soviet Union. Its point was that various alternatives to the Soviet-derived model existed only in the minds of their advocates, while 'actual socialism' existed in the real world.

The term was also taken up by some

dissidents A dissident is a person who actively challenges an established political or religious system, doctrine, belief, policy, or institution. In a religious context, the word has been used since the 18th century, and in the political sense since the 2 ...

, such as Rudolf Bahro, who used it in a more critical way.

Notes

References

Citations

Sources

; General
Real socialism
from ''A Dictionary of Sociology'', 1998, originally published by Oxford University Press. {{Authority control Ideology of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Socialism Comecon Economy of the Soviet Union Soviet phraseology Political economy

Definition

See also

Notes

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Sources