Partiinost’

Partiinost’ (Russian for partyness, often translated as party-mindedness, partisanship or party spirit) was long the controlling principle of Soviet Marxism. Though commonly identified with thought control, partiinost’ originally signified social analysis of thought joined with moral judgment, an ancient combination that can work against the powers that be as well as for them. Lenin’s version changed from revolt to thought control after his party came to power in 1917, but especially after Stalin’s ‘revolution from above’ twelve years later. In 1950 Stalin began a restriction of partiinost’ by declaring ‘science’ separate from ‘ideology’. Such reform accelerated after his death in 1953, but slowed down from the mid-1960s to the late 1980s. Then a new burst of reform set off the collapse of the Soviet system and of partiinost’, though the problems that engendered it – the entanglement of group interests and claims of truth – persist.