Modernization and Participation in the Leninist Developmental Strategy

Philip G. Roeder

American Political Science Review, 1989, vol. 83, issue 3, 859-884

Abstract: The Soviet Union achieved its stability in the early stages of development not by institutionalizing participation but by forcing departicipation and substituting a functionally distinct form of political activity—involvement in co-production. These policies constitute essential complements in the Leninist developmental strategy. The ability of enlisted involvement to block the growth of participatory pressures tends to decline in later stages of development, however. The result is spontaneous withdrawal from the institutions of coproduction and the rise of participatory pressures. This pattern is documented with evidence from Soviet electoral and membership statistics, Soviet reports of opinion surveys, Western interviews of Soviet émigrés, and cross-national estimates of political dissidence. The Leninist crisis of participation requires a policy response to close the participation-institution gap once again. The alternative policy responses of Soviet general secretaries are characterized as totalitarian, authoritarian, liberal, and socialist.

Date: 1989
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