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The scholarship on the impact on communists of Khrushchev's 'secret speech' to the twentieth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1956 is limited. Generally it is located within broader studies of organisational upheavals and ideological debates at the leadership level of communist parties. Rarely has there been analysis of the reverberations at the individual level. Consistent with James R. Barrett's pioneering approach, this paper seeks to incorporate the personal into the political, and inject a subjective dimension into the familiar top-down narrative of American communism. It will do this by focusing on the motivations, reactions and consequences of the defection of one Party member, the writer Howard Fast. It will thereby illuminate the story of personal anguish experienced by thousands in the wake of Khrushchev's revelations about Stalin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper comments on the approach and findings of the preceding papers on the psychology of enemy images, and presents numerous suggestions about needed and feasible research. The research cited mostly used the approaches of attitude measurement and of social-cognitive theories, including attribution and social identity theories, and it employed various research methods, including survey, quasiexperimental, and experimental methods. The main empirical focus of these studies was recent U.S. attitudes toward the USSR, which were found to bias the attitude holders' information processing, mostly in predicted ways. Nevertheless, available evidence suggests that most of the American public do not have extremely stereotyped, diabolical enemy images of the Soviet Union, its people, or its leaders, and furthermore, that U.S. attitudes toward the USSR are softening rapidly under the impact of events of the last few years. Determinants of anti-Soviet attitudes are discussed, and hypotheses and speculations are presented about the motivations and sources of enemy images generally, how they may be changed, and their larger implications from the standpoint of cognitive and ego-developmental theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article the author presents his views on Communism and Socialism in the U.S. A utopia, in which wealth would be distributed for the equal benefit of all, is not for men, because they are men, no matter under whose rule they exist, moreover, there is no possible way of distributing wealth to men in equal shares. Those who advocated such a system were honest, sincere thinkers, who put it forward as an alternative to the system of an unequal distribution of wealth. It ought not to be necessary to point out that the Socialists themselves have always been the bitterest critics of those who enter the political field, who would try to bring it about increment by increment, and temporize with the catalytic principle. The student has only to read the works of Philosophical Anarchists and Socialists at the time when economist Karl Marx published his paper, to realize that the bitterest controversies raged among them for many years as to what gospel should be advocated and the means by which it could be established.

The article introduces several papers about the problem of anti-intellectualism in the United States from a number of perspectives. These perspectives include historical, political, economic, sociological, educational and psychological. Alfred L. Kroeber advances the thesis that fine arts, among other achievements of Western civilization, are reaching a stage of imitation and repetition which may conceivably signalize a period of cultural decadence. Leuchtenburg in his article, mentioned Marxism as an intellectual or anti-intellectual force in American culture.

Anarchists and autonomist Marxists played a vital role in the development of the Alternative Globalization Movement (AGM), especially with regard to their distinct contributions and insights in the realm of strategy and organization. Despite their common anticapitalist and antiauthoritarian orientation, however, their practical and theoretical approaches to issues of organization and change remain substantially different and in some contexts have been deeply divisive. This paper explores the theoretical and practical similarities and differences between anarchists and autonomists. It begins with an analysis of the tenuous binary between “lifestyle” and “social” anarchism, primarily within the U.S., where anarchism has significantly impacted AGM activism. What follows is a discussion of autonomist movements in Italy and Germany from the 1950s onward. The article then compares both tendencies in terms of how they balance the organizational requisites for change with their desires for freedom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Traces some of the sources and consequences of the approach of students in the U.S. to both the theory and practice of activism in relation to the issues of communism and anticommunism. History of student activism; Details of the founding of the National Student Association; Activities of the Students for a Democratic Society.

Objective: Previous studies of American English isms terms have uncovered as many as five broad factors: tradition-oriented religiousness (TR), subjective spirituality (SS), communal rationalism (CR), unmitigated self-interest (USI), and inequality aversion (IA). The present studies took a similar lexical approach to investigate the Chinese-language isms structures in both mainland China and Taiwan.Method and Results: In Study 1, exploratory factor analyses with 915 mainland Chinese subjects uncovered four interpretable factors dimensionalizing 165 mainland Chinese dictionary isms terms. These factors represented contents of a combination of TR and SS, USI, CR, and a culturally unique Communist Party of China (CPC) ideology factor. In Study 2, exploratory factor analyses with 467 Taiwan Chinese subjects revealed four interpretable factors categorizing 291 Taiwan Chinese dictionary isms terms. These factors represented contents of a combination of TR and SS, USI, CR, and a culturally unique dimension expressing aspirations for happiness.Conclusions: The results gave evidence for the existence of the isms factors TR and SS, USI, and CR in Chinese culture. Cultural uniqueness was reflected in the merging of TR and SS into the factor Syncretic Religiousness and the culture-specific factors of CPC ideology in China and Happiness/Peace Promotion in Taiwan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that because Jennifer Luff broke with the reigning paradigm about how to investigate anticommunism, her Commonsense Anticommunism is a major achievement. She asks historians of all kinds to look differently at the interwar period. Despite several flaws, this book deserves many readers and much emulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the Kennedy administration's rejection of French President Charles de Gaulle's critique of American intervention in Vietnam. In discussions with their American counterparts, de Gaulle and his officials consistently touched on four major themes from his first meeting with Kennedy in May 1961 until Kennedy's assassination in November 1963: recognition of the principle of Vietnamese self-determination, the withdrawal of American troops from South Vietnam, acceptance of controlled neutrality for Southeast Asia, and the necessity of dealing with mainland China directly. Kennedy rejected all elements of this platform. He was highly sceptical of neutrality, which he viewed as a stalking horse for communism, and believed that the United States needed to show resolve in Southeast Asia or risk jeopardizing its prestige with allies across the globe. The manner in which Kennedy's New Frontiersmen framed their rejection of de Gaulle's position on Vietnam reflected long-standing American cultural antipathy toward Europe, France, in particular. At no point did the Kennedy administration recognize the Gaullist position on Vietnam as a legitimate expression of relevant French experience nor did it believe that France was capable of acting as an honest broker and negotiating a real truce between North and South. As a result, the Kennedy administration missed out on a perfect opportunity to disengage from a grim and distant conflict late in the summer of 1963, when de Gaulle had the resources and the will to broker peace. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an examination of American attitudes towards toy guns during the early Cold War era. During this period representations of cowboys and the Old West flourished among the toys and behavior of white male youths. The article explores how the context of the Cold War, attitudes towards gender roles and the threat of nuclear war and communism helped promote an environment that allowed youth gun culture to thrive in the United States. It explores issues such as children's play in the atomic age, masculinity and parenting.

Even many radicals agree with liberals who quote conservatives who assure us that Lenin and his revolutionary communist perspectives were inhumane and authoritarian—but important new scholarship compellingly argues that such allegations are false. In the post-9/11 world, dominant ideologies are being undermined by political and social crises generating insurgent forces that may be ready to see a new relevance in Lenin. Varieties of conservatism, reformism, anarchism, and fundamentalism (secular as well as religious) have been tried, continue to be tried, and yet the times in which we live seem to grow more terrible. What masses of people are experiencing, feeling, and thinking today gives recent Lenin-influenced works a growing resonance, and so they may find a greater “market” than previously has been the case. With the appearance of such scholarship, each offering challenging interpretations, we may be on the eve of a Lenin revival. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author reflects on global economic prospects in the twenty-first century. He supports the thesis put forward by Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm. He further refers to development in India and China and the decline of the U.S. Various factors affecting the global economic prospects are discussed including modern communism and gross domestic product.

Reports on the problems posed by the government intelligence agencies for a democratic society in the U.S. Extension of the jurisdiction of the intelligence agencies to all areas touching on foreign affairs; Discussion of the domestic operations of the intelligence agencies; Investigation of the growth of fascism and communism in the country.

Discusses author James R. Prickett's view on the role of the Communist Party in the United States labor movement. Nature of the internal controversy in Nonferrous Metals Industry Unionism; Technique of guilt by association; Alliance between Socialists and gangsters to defeat the Communists; Debate at the 1941 United Mobile Workers' Convention; Communists' propaganda against blacks.

There are major methodological and practical problems in comparing the performance of capitalist and communist economies. They have been most carefully analysed for the former Soviet Union, for which there was a huge research input, mainly by the CIA. The CIA effort had considerable merit, particularly in assessing Soviet rates of growth. Unfortunately, it was terminated in 1991, partly because it suffered from unduly harsh criticism, partly because its political relevance waned. However. the CIA archives remain an important source for the study of comparative economic growth. It would be extremely useful if they were opened to scholars, a serious loss if they were destroyed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

National survey questions have been asked in the United States about the Soviet Union since 1937. with repeated use of standard global favorability questions by Gallup since 1953 and by NORC since 1974. Americans expressed declining negativity toward the Soviets from 1953 until 1974, then rising hostility until 1982–1983. with another decline between 1983 and 1988. Problems in interpreting such survey data are discussed, including discrepancies between closed and open questions. Although closed questions elicit generally negative attitudes, there is reason to question their salience and depth, just as Stouffer (1955) did in interpreting attitudes toward domestic communists during the McCarthy period. Survey data are used to explore two plausible theories about anti-Soviet attitudes in the United States: that such attitudes are (a) primarily ideological, reflecting hostility toward socialism and communism as social systems, or (b) that they are mainly a function of U.S. nationalism, indicating that the Soviets are viewed as national rivals in a competition for world dominance. The available data, although far from adequate to the task, seem more consistent with the nationalism explanation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the components of the Marxist theory of urban planning in advanced capitalist societies with emphasis on the impact of Marxist theory within the U.S. The urban planning theory is defined as a theory of planning process and a theory of urban structure and development. Marxists have emphasized the importance of state planning for stabilizing the economy and averting system crisis. The U.S. presents an extremely segmented state and fragmented urban planning functions. Segmentation can be seen in the federal structure. Local governmental units are the primary agencies responsible for urban planning and development, while the national government provides most of the revenue for planning activities which benefit the lower classes. Thus the local officials and professional planners who may have egalitarian concerns are constrained by national budget decisions which reflect the interests of corporate capital and suburban voters. The Marxist paradigm provides a new set of categories to interpret planning activity as well as a theoretical reformulation of the character and structure of urban form and human settlement.

The purpose of this article is, first, to examine how Marx's theory contributes to an understanding of' uneven rural development and, second, to use a historical case study of uneven capitalist development in cotton production in the American South during the period from 18701930 to inform the theory and to provide a better understanding of some of the obstacles to the capitalist development of agriculture. Through a comparative, regional analysis, some of the social, historical, and technical factors that accounted for this uneven development are examined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When nearly 1,000 American men, women and children lost their lives in a mass murder and suicide rite in 1978 staged by a madman, Jim Jones, a former Christian minister turned Communist leader, many Americans asked, "Why?" The press, overcoming earlier lethargy, amassed facts permitting a sophisticated psychological and sociological explanation. Neglected, however, was the question why was the Jonestown Communist utopia sited in the Guyana jungle? Given the human and geographical circumstances, its siting in the Guyana rain forest was highly probable, affording evidence that, to some extent, at least, people and their geography determine human events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent trends in historical scholarship view askance the reformers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Analyses, which range from the Pluralism of a Richard Hofstadter to the neo-Marxism of a James Weinstein or Gabriel Kolko differ markedly, yet contain similar viewpoints about the worth of a variety of American reform movements. Status anxieties, naive urges for capitalistic efficiency, racialist assumptions, and individual psychological make-ups, are imputed to the reformers of the Populist and Progressive eras. It is alleged that they failed to understand the forces of industrialization, and in time capitulated to the corporate powers that they apparently opposed. It is possible that by concentrating too strongly on the alleged failures of varied reformers, there is some misunderstanding of their accomplishment. The career of the businessman-reformer, Nelson Olsen Nelson, can sharpen one's awareness of those times, which gave various reform urges scope. It can trace a curve of acceptability, and provide a gauge for changing perceptions of debate and action. Nelson's persistent cooperative endeavors shed light on a complex strand of American reform, which has survived to play a continuing role in the formation of the world.

The three not-so-obvious contributions (or potential contributions) of psychology to peace are: First, a corollary of the Hovland two-sided approach: namely, that we Americans should strenuously seek common ground with the Communists, and publicly accept all we can honestly accept of the Communist point of view. Second, the proposition that the mirror-image type of war is most likely to break out when there is overlapping and conflict of territorial self-images. It follows that reducing such overlap by clarifying boundaries, or even by deliberate withdrawal at certain points, would contribute to peace. And third, the Pro-us Illusion, with the further proposition that if we Americans had not been indulging in it, neither the Bay of Pigs nor the Vietnam war would have occurred. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the rise and decline of socialism in the U.S. This article has the following objectives: (1) to survey briefly the growth of socialism in America; (2) to present and analyze the Marxian position on the role of the socialists, and (3) to discuss the institutional and economic factors retarding the growth of socialist parties in the United States. Between 1901, when the new Socialist Party was established in the United States, and 1912, the tide of socialism seemed to be reaching a swell in the U.S. and in Europe, and many were predicting that in a short time all industrial nations would be engulfed. From very meager beginnings, the U.S. party grew into an organization with 150,000 affiliated members and with a voting strength of nearly one million. In 1910 Victor Berger became the first socialist ever to win election to Congress. But, just as the various national philosophies in Europe produced Marx, Bakunin and the Fabians, so did American socialism suffer from the divisions brought by a failure to achieve anything resembling unity. Perhaps the basic conflict centered on the role of trade unions and political organizations in meeting the challenge of a growing capitalism.

The article debates on the issues related to Socialism. When, in 1907, Victor Grayson was elected to Great Britain Parliament as a declared Socialist, in a three-cornered election, he was unable to define the terms "Socialist" and "Communist." Today, in the U.S., it is not unusual to find Socialists protesting that they are liberals, and as Socialists demanding a restoration of rights. The charge that was often made against the political Socialist was that he was illiterate so far as a knowledge of his subject' was concerned. During the campaign in Great Britain. many preachers of that gospel admitted that they learned more about Socialism at Liberal meetings than they could from their own speakers. Much has been made of the sweeping victory achieved by the workers in the recent general election in Great Britain. Many of U.S. weeklies have hailed it as a Socialist triumph, and some of conservative publicists have condemned it as such. It is nothing of the kind. Although the term Socialism has covered the party platform and the majority of the candidates elected have stood as Socialists, the program calls for nothing more than schemes for nationalizing the Bank of England, some industries, and certain services.

Replies to author Walter Galenson's view on the role of the Communist party in the United States labor movement. Determination whether Communists were democratic or undemocratic leaders the way they exercised leadership; Limited functions of trade unions in a democratic capitalist society; Assumption of hidden communist motives; Existence of a Socialist-gangster alliance against the Communists.