Historical Legacies of Communism Modern Politics, Society, and Economic Development

Libman and Obydenkova reveal how legacies of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) have survived in the politics, economic development, culture, and society of post-Communist regions in the 21st Century. The authors show how this impact is not driven by Communist ideology but by the clientelistic practices, opportunism and cynicism prevalent in the CPSU. Their study is built on a novel dataset of the CPSU membership rates in Russian regions in the 1950s-1980s, alongside case studies, interviews and an analysis of mass media previously only available in Russian and discussed here in English for the first time. It will appeal to students and scholars of Russian and Eastern European politics and history, and anyone who wants to better understand countries which live or have lived through Communism: from Eastern Europe to China and East Asian Communist states.

1. Introduction; 2. The CPSU legacy: Leninism or clientelism? 3. Cultural environment and Soviet cinematography as a legacy of the CPSU; 4. Measuring CPSU legacies; 5. Democracy; 6. Corruption; 7. Inequality; 8. Mortality; 9. Attitudes towards migrants; 10. Economic development and innovations; 11. The origin and persistence of legacies; 12. Conclusion.

Alexander Libman is Professor of Social Sciences and Eastern European Studies at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, and a research affiliate at the International Center for the Study of Institutions and Development of the National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow. He is the author, co-author or co-editor of ten books.
Anastassia V. Obydenkova is a visiting Professor at Barcelona Institute of International Studies, leading research fellow at National Research University Higher School of Economics, research affiliate at Institute for Economic Analysis of Spanish Council for Scientific Research. She was a Fox Fellow at Yale University, Fung Fellow at Princeton University, and Davis Senior Research Scholar at Harvard University. She is the author of multiple articles and books.