Immo Rebitschek and Aaron B. Retish, "Social Control under Stalin and Khrushchev: The Phantom of a Well-Ordered State" (U Toronto Press, 2023)

Oct 21, 2023

Social Control under Stalin and Khrushchev

The Phantom of a Well-Ordered State

Immo Rebitschek and Aaron B. Retish

Hosted by Samantha Lomb

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Summary

How did the Soviet Union control the behaviour of its people? How did the people themselves engage with the official rules and the threat of violence in their lives?

In Immo Rebitschek and Aaron B. Retish's book Social Control under Stalin and Khrushchev: The Phantom of a Well-Ordered State (U Toronto Press, 2023), the contributors examine how social control developed under Stalin and Khrushchev. Drawing on deep archival research from across the former Soviet Union, they analyse the wide network of state institutions that were used for regulating individual behaviour and how Soviet citizens interacted with them. Together they show that social control in the Soviet Union was not entirely about the monolithic state imposing its vision with violent force. Instead, a wide range of institutions such as the police, the justice system, and party-sponsored structures in factories and farms tried to enforce control.

The book highlights how the state leadership itself adjusted its policing strategies and moved away from mass repression towards legal pressure for policing society. Ultimately, Social Control under Stalin and Khrushchev explores how the Soviet state controlled the behaviour of its citizens and how the people relied on these structures.

Samantha Lomb is a lecturer at Vyatka State University in Kirov, Russia.