THE 1961 CPSU PROGRAM AS A SOURCE ON THE HISTORY OF SOVIET IDEOLOGY

DOI: 10.47026/2712-9454-2025-6-2-49-57

УДК 94(47).084.9

ББК 63.3(2)632-3

Andrey V. FOKIN

Key words

Soviet ideology, the CPSU program, class worldview, worldview, building communism, material and technical base of communism, socialist society, class struggle, socialist construction.

Abstract

The Soviet ideology evolved throughout the existence of the state having the same name. To understand the consistent patterns of this evolution, it is necessary to carefully study the key documents in which the key provisions and patterns of ideology were formulated. One of these documents is the Third Program of the CPSU, adopted by the XXII Congress in October 1961. The ideologemes embedded in it had a decisive influence on the development of the Soviet society in the 60s and 80s of the ΧΧ century.

The aim is to identify the key provisions that, complementing the ideological picture, compared with the previous period, led to a discrepancy between ideological postulates and the objective reality of the Soviet society.

Materials and methods. The subject of the study is the influence of the Third CPSU Program on the further evolution of Soviet ideology. The term «ideology» is used in the work in its Leninist understanding, as an analogue to the «worldview» of the corresponding class. The study is based on the analysis of the socio-political construct of the Soviet society and the surrounding world, built in the text of the CPSU program, and comparison of this «picture» with the realities of the early 60s of the ΧΧ century.

Results. The analysis of the main provisions and slogans of the program revealed contradictions both within the provisions themselves and between them. Some of them were caused by objective circumstances, but there was no abandonment of the usual slogans in the new party program. The analysis of trends in social development is replaced by a mechanical reproduction of a usual set of declarations. Based on the analysis of the main source, the following conclusions can be drawn: successes of the first post-war decades led the Soviet society into a state of mass euphoria, which resulted in a decrease in the quality of introspection and self-criticism and set up the party and the society in an unreasonably optimistic mood. Most of the tasks facing the Soviet state were considered to be practically solved; as a result, algorithms for solving relevant problems disappeared from the document. Rigid time constraints to achieve the strategic goal of the USSR’s existence, the building of communism, proved inappropriate.

Conclusions. The 1961 CPSU program is a vivid example of «degeneration» of the creative thought in Soviet ideologists. The CPSU leadership actually replaced the ideals of the communist society in the program with the desire for consumption, the highest party elite began to consider striving for communism solely as a tool for controlling public consciousness. This significantly lowered the level of the CPSU’s Third Program as a strategic planning document and laid a «delayed-action mine» under the Soviet state.

References

1. Bratishchev I.M. Tret’ya Programma KPSS kak popytka forsirovannogo sblizheniya teorii s praktikoy (k 60-letiyu prinyatiya dokumenta [The Third Program of the CPSU as an attempt to force the convergence of theory with practice (to the 60^th anniversary of the adoption of the document)]. Available at: https://kprf.ru/ruso/206621.html (Accessed Date: 2024, Apr. 4).
2. Zinov’ev A.A. Ideologiya partii budushchego [Ideology of the party of the future]. Moscow, 2003. 240 p.
3. Krugman P. Kredo liberala [The credo of a liberal] Moscow, 2009, 368 p.
4. Lenin V.I. Boykotirovat’ li Gosudarstvennuyu Dumu? Platforma «bol’shinstva» [Should the State Duma be boycotted? The platform of the «majority»]. sobr. soch. [Complete set of works]. Moscow, 1968, vol. 12, pp. 158–161.
5. Lenin V.I. Zadachi russkikh sotsial-demokratov [Tasks of Russian social Democrats]. In: Lenin V.I. sobr. soch. [Complete set of works]. Moscow, 1967, vol. 2, pp. 433–470.
6. Lenin V.I. Chto delat’? O nabolevshikh voprosakh nashego dvizheniya [What should I do? On the urgent issues of our movement]. In: sobr. soch. [Complete set of works]. Moscow, 1963, vol. 6, pp. 1–192.
7. Lenin V.I. Ekonomicheskoye soderzhaniye narodnichestva i kritika yego v knige G. Struve (Otrazheniye marksizma v burzhuaznoy literature) [The economic content of narodism and its criticism in the book by G. Struve (Reflection of Marxism in bourgeois literature)]. In: Lenin V.I. sobr. soch. [Complete set of works]. Moscow, 1967, vol. 1, pp. 347–534.
8. Programma Kommunisticheskoy partii Sovetskogo Soyuza. Prinyata XXIII s’’yezdom KPSS. Ustav KPSS [Program of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Adopted by the XXIII Congress of the CPSU. The Charter of the CPSU]. Moscow, 1962, 288 p.
9. Semenkov V.E. O mirovozzrencheskikh osnovaniyakh III-yey programmy KPSS [On the ideological foundations of the III program of the CPSU]. Vestnik Sankt-Peterburgskogo universiteta. 12. Sociologia. 2013, vyp. 1, pp. 111–115.
10. Blagosostoyanie naroda [USSR. The welfare of the people]. Available at: https://gufo.me/dict/bse/ysclid=m8csxiv6bn636778202 (Accessed Date: 2025, Mar. 17).

Information about the author

Andrey V. Fokin – Senior Lecturer, Military Educational Center at the Nizhny Novgorod State University named after N.I. Lobachevsky, National Research Nizhny Novgorod State University named after N.I. Lobachevsky, Russia, Nizhny Novgorod (fokin_andrey78@mail.ru).

For citations

Fokin A.V. The 1961 CPSU program as a source on the history of soviet ideology. Historical Search, 2025, vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 49–57. DOI: 10.47026/2712-9454-2025-6-2-49-57 (in Russian).

Download the full article