Exposing Stalin's personality cult. Exposing the “cult of personality” i.v.

Prominent figures play an important role in historical events as leaders, organizers and inspirers of the struggle of the masses and classes, but the decisive role in history belongs to the masses. K. Marx, F. Engels, V.I. Lenin, fearing the possibility of the cult of personality entering the revolutionary movement, as one of the most disgusting relics of the past, resolutely fought against all its manifestations [ ] . In 1877 Marx wrote:

“... out of disgust for any cult of personality, during the existence of the International, I never allowed the numerous appeals in which my merits were recognized and were pestered by me from different countries to be made public - I never even answered them, except from time to time to reprimand for them. The first entry of Engels and myself into the secret society of communists took place under the indispensable condition that everything that promotes superstitious admiration for authorities would be thrown out of the rules...”

V.I. Lenin, being the generally recognized leader of the Communist Party and the people, met with exceptional hostility any demonstration of veneration of his personality. Emphasizing the decisive role of the masses in historical creativity, Lenin said:

“...The minds of tens of millions of creators create something immeasurably higher than the greatest and most brilliant foresight.”

Lenin's methods, Lenin's style of party and state activity certainly excluded the ideology and practice of the cult of personality. In the party under Lenin there was no one-man command, no blind admiration for authority, not to mention the persecution of those who openly polemicized with Lenin. Lenin taught that the leadership of the ruling political party and the construction of socialism can be successful only under the condition that the party does not break away from the working masses, does not command them, but learns from the masses and directs their actions, strictly taking into account objective and subjective conditions. Lenin always attached great importance to the question of the personal qualities of leading party leaders. Back in 1903 he wrote:

“... it is necessary that the entire party systematically, gradually and steadily educate suitable people in the center, so that it sees before itself, in full view, all the activities of each candidate for this high post, so that it becomes familiar even with their individual characteristics, with them strong and weaknesses, with their victories and “defeats.”

Even then Lenin said that it was necessary to give the opportunity to the mass of party workers “...to recognize your leaders and put each of them on the proper shelf”

The emergence of the personality cult of J.V. Stalin

In the last years of his life, being seriously ill, Lenin in his letters and articles called for a number of measures to ensure the unity of the Communist Party and to strengthen the Party Central Committee. Lenin devoted his “Letter to the Congress” (December 1922 - January 1923), known as “Testament,” mainly to characterizing the personal qualities and traits of the leading members of the Party Central Committee. Characterizing in this letter I.V. Stalin, L.D. Trotsky, G.E. Zinoviev, L.B. Kamenev, N.I. Bukharin and G.L. Pyatakov, Lenin pointed out both their positive and negative quality. Drawing the party's attention to the question of the personal qualities and relationships of the leading figures of the Central Committee, Lenin emphasized that “... this is not a trifle, or it is such a trifle that can become decisive.” Over the years of his revolutionary activity, Stalin accumulated extensive experience in leading party work, but had some extremely negative personal qualities. “Comrade Stalin, having become General Secretary, wrote Lenin on December 24. 1922, - concentrated immense power in his hands, and I’m not sure whether he will always be able to use this power carefully enough.” Lenin proposed to think about a way to remove Stalin from this post. January 4, 1923 Lenin, in a dictated addition to his letter dated December 24, 1922, stated:

“Stalin is too rude, and this shortcoming, quite tolerable in the environment and in communications between us communists, becomes intolerable in the position of Secretary General. Therefore, I suggest that the comrades consider a way to move Stalin from this place and appoint another person to this place, who in all other respects differs from Comrade. Stalin has only one advantage, namely, more tolerant, more loyal, more polite and more attentive to his comrades, less capriciousness, etc.”

Due to the prevailing circumstances, Stalin was not then relieved of his duties as General Secretary of the Central Committee. The next XII Congress of the RCP(b) took place in Moscow on April 17-25, 1923, but Lenin’s “Testament” was not communicated to the delegates of this congress.

A few months after the XII Congress, in the fall of 1923, the opposition, led by Trotsky, openly came out with an anti-Leninist platform. The Party Central Committee, headed by Stalin, organized the party's struggle against the Trotskyist opposition. Lenin died in January 1924. At the end of May 1924, the XIII Congress of the RCP(b) was held, to the delegates of which Lenin’s “Testament” was communicated not at a meeting of the congress, but at meetings of delegations of individual republics, territories, and provinces. After reading the “Testament,” the leaders of the delegations (secretaries of local party bodies) posed the question to their comrades: is it advisable, in conditions of acute internal party struggle, to relieve Stalin from the post of General Secretary. The delegations of the XIII Congress, and then members of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), at the plenum held immediately after the congress, discussed Lenin’s letter in a difficult internal party situation. Sincerely hoping that Stalin would conscientiously fulfill his promise to take into account Lenin’s criticism, the delegates to the congress and the plenum of the Central Committee spoke in favor of leaving him as general. Secretary of the Central Committee.

The reasons for the emergence of Stalin's personality cult

When considering the emergence of Stalin's personality cult, it is necessary to take into account both objective, specific historical conditions, and subjective factors associated with Stalin's personal qualities. The Communist Party led the construction of socialism in the USSR in an extremely difficult international and domestic situation (capitalist encirclement, the threat of military attack, fierce class struggle in the country, when the question of “who will win?” was being decided, the fight against Trotskyists, right-wing opportunists, as well as bourgeois nationalists). These conditions required iron discipline, centralization of leadership, and some limitation of democracy.

“But these restrictions were already considered by the party and the people as temporary, to be eliminated as the Soviet state strengthened and the forces of democracy and socialism developed throughout the world. The people consciously made these temporary sacrifices, seeing every day more and more successes of the Soviet social system.”

The country was carrying out the first experience in history of building a socialist society, which was formed in the process of searching, testing in practice many truths, previously known only in general terms, in theory. The USSR was the only country that paved the way to socialism. Overcoming enormous difficulties during all the pre-war five-year plans, the previously backward country, as a result of the heroic efforts of the party and the entire people, made a giant leap in its political, economic and cultural development. In those years, Stalin, together with other leading figures of the party, acted as a major organizer of the struggle of the Soviet people to build socialism. He led the party's struggle against deviations from the Leninist line allowed by the Trotskyists, then by the Zinoviev-Kamenev group, and subsequently by the Bukharin-Rykov-Tomsky group. In a number of works included in the collection “Questions of Leninism,” Stalin defended Lenin’s provisions on the possibility of the victory of socialism in one particular country, which armed the party in the fight against the opposition; all this gained him great authority among the party and the people. In this situation, a Cult of personality Stalin. All the victories and successes achieved by the Communist Party and the Soviet country began to be incorrectly associated with the name of Stalin. The praise for Stalin turned his head. At that stage, Stalin’s negative qualities affected. He did not seek to convince opponents, to subordinate them to the ideological influence of the party, to resolve emerging disagreements and contradictions using democratic, party methods, as Lenin did, but resorted to administrative methods. He, contrary to the decisions of the party congresses on the development of internal party democracy, departed from the Leninist method of collective leadership and personally made decisions on the most important issues.

“...Stalin, having enormously overestimated his merits, believed in his own infallibility. Some restrictions on internal party and Soviet democracy, inevitable in conditions of a fierce struggle with the class enemy and his agents, and later in conditions of war against Nazi invaders, Stalin began to normalize internal party and state life, grossly trampling on Lenin’s principles of leadership.”

Manifestations of the cult of personality

Stalin began to violate the party's statutory requirements, which was reflected in the irregular convening of party congresses and plenums of the Central Committee, the curtailment of the work of the Politburo of the Central Committee as a collective body of leadership, the violation of internal party democracy in the form of the replacement of elections to party bodies with co-optation, etc. Even in the difficult conditions of foreign military intervention and the civil war, in the first 6 years after October (1918-23), under Lenin, 6 all-party congresses, 5 conferences, 79 plenums of the Party Central Committee took place. In the first 10 years after Lenin's death (1924-33), 4 party congresses, 5 conferences, and 43 plenums of the Central Committee took place, mostly devoted to the fight against oppositions and deviations. But over the next 20 years (1934-53), only 3 party congresses and one conference took place, and the interval between the XVIII and XIX congresses was 13 years. Over two decades, only 23 plenums of the Central Committee were convened. In 1941, 1942, 1943, 1945, 1946, 1948, 1950 and 1951 there was not a single plenum of the Central Committee.

By violating Lenin’s “Testament,” Stalin placed himself above the party’s Central Committee, got out of its control, and protected himself from criticism. Stalin methodically strengthened the cult of his personality; he attributed to himself excessive services to the party, the successes achieved by the people in civil war, in the construction of socialism, in the defeat of Hitler's hordes. Monuments to Stalin were erected everywhere. In order to create an aura of Stalin’s infallibility, the history of the party was distorted, the theory of “two leaders” was persistently propagated, the version that Stalin was the very person who, together with Lenin, created the Bolshevik party, developed its theory and tactics.

Consequences of the cult of personality

In March 1922, Lenin noted the enormous, undivided authority “...that thinnest layer that can be called the old party guard”. It was these people who knew the truth about Stalin’s real and imaginary merits, and they clearly interfered with Stalin. The slightest attempts to counter the falsification of the history of the party began to be regarded by Stalin as “hostile attacks” or “conciliation towards them”; a merciless reprisal began against persons disliked by Stalin. Stalin made a fair statement that as we move towards socialism, the class struggle becomes more and more intensified. Unfortunately, this to some extent served as a theoretical justification for the repressions. Repressions against Leninist party cadres, honest government and economic leaders, command and political personnel of the Red Army, ordinary communists and Soviet citizens caused heavy damage.

The cult of Stalin's personality contributed to the spread of vicious methods, naked administration, and violations of internal party democracy in party building and economic work. In planning and management national economy voluntarism and subjectivism, neglect of economic laws and incentives for the development of production were generated, and the socialist principle of payment according to work was seriously violated. The atmosphere of Stalin’s personality cult harmed the social sciences, including philosophical and historical, and in particular the study of the history of the party, which slowed down creative development Marxism-Leninism, weakened the influence of science on the development of society.

““...there were certain periods, for example, during the war years, when Stalin’s individual actions were sharply limited, when the negative consequences of lawlessness, arbitrariness, etc. were significantly weakened. It is known that it was during the war that members of the Central Committee, as well as outstanding Soviet military leaders took into their own hands certain areas of activity in the rear and at the front, made decisions independently and through their organizational, political, economic and military work, together with local party and Soviet organizations, ensured the victory of the Soviet people in the war.”

Overcoming

Within the Central Committee of the party there were figures who correctly understood the urgent needs in the field of domestic and foreign policy and countered the negative phenomena associated with Stalin’s cult of personality. However, in conditions when Stalin had enormous authority in the party and among the people, an open speech against him would not have been understood and would not have received support.

“Moreover, such a speech would be regarded in those conditions as an attack against the cause of building socialism, as an extremely dangerous undermining of the unity of the party and the entire state in a capitalist environment. In addition, the successes that the working people achieved Soviet Union under the leadership of their Communist Party, instilled legitimate pride in the heart of everyone Soviet man and created an atmosphere where individual mistakes and shortcomings seemed less significant against the backdrop of enormous successes, and the negative consequences of these mistakes were quickly compensated for by the colossally growing vitality of the party and Soviet society.”

It is impossible not to take into account the fact that many facts and incorrect actions of Stalin, especially in the area of violation of the rule of law, became known after his death.

In 1956, the 20th Congress of the CPSU made a historical turn in the development of the party and the country, the entire communist movement, marking the beginning of the restoration of Leninist norms of party and state life. Fundamental measures were taken to restore and further develop socialist democracy, Leninist principles of state, party life and economic development, and strict adherence to socialist legality.

The Central Committee of the CPSU, having openly exposed the grave consequences of Stalin's personality cult, neutralized the political adventurer, discarded a group of adherents of the personality cult and its methods - Molotov, Kaganovich, Malenkov, revealed and decisively eliminated the grossest violations of socialist legality. The party was aware that identified errors and perversions, disclosure of abuses of power could cause a feeling of bitterness and deep regret in the party ranks and among the people, and would create temporary difficulties for the CPSU and fraternal Marxist-Leninist parties. But the party boldly met difficulties; it honestly and openly told the people the whole truth, deeply believing that its line would be correctly understood. The Central Committee of the CPSU, the XX and XXII Congresses told the party and the people the truth about Stalin, based on Lenin’s instructions:

“The Pharisees of the bourgeoisie love the saying: either remain silent about the dead or speak good. The proletariat needs the truth about both living political figures and dead ones, for those who truly deserve the name of political figure do not die for politics when their physical death occurs.”

Literature

XX Congress of the CPSU. Verbatim report, parts 1-2, M., 1956;
XXII Congress of the CPSU. Verbatim report, parts 1-3, M., 1961;
About overcoming the cult of personality and its consequences. Resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU, M., 1956.

Criticism of the “cult of personality”

The main role in the work that began to overcome the cult of Stalin belonged to N.S. Khrushchev, elected in September 1953 to the post of First Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. The appearance of this political figure reflected, like a drop of water, the controversial era that raised him and promoted him to the ranks of state leaders. On the one hand, he was a skillful, energetic leader who invested a lot of effort in implementing plans for the development and transformation of the country; he willingly communicated with the people, as evidenced, in particular, by his numerous visits to factories and mines, collective farms and construction sites. On the other hand, N.S. Khrushchev was a typical representative of the former Stalinist circle, who played a certain role in the fight against “opponents” of the party’s general line, as well as in the persecution of party and Soviet cadres in Moscow and Ukraine, where he held leadership positions.

According to Khrushchev, the party leaders, after the arrest of Beria on July 10, 1953, were faced with so many revelations about the activities of the political police apparatus and falsified conspiracies that all of them, including Khrushchev, came to the conclusion that it was necessary to obtain more complete information. It was Khrushchev who was tasked with reading the report and personally meeting the unpredictable reaction of the congress participants. Nevertheless, Khrushchev played a decisive role and was a catalyst for the exposure - selective and controlled - of Stalin's crimes.

The 20th Congress of the CPSU opened on February 14, 1956 in the Kremlin; it gathered 1,436 delegates, mostly experienced apparatchiks, as well as members of 55 “fraternal parties.” Convened eight months before the statutory deadline in connection with the urgent need to take stock of the changes that had taken place since Stalin's death and discussions about the choice of course, the congress ended with Khrushchev's famous “secret report”.

On the last day of the 20th Congress, at a closed meeting - February 25, 1956, the First Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee N.S. made a report “On the cult of personality and its consequences”. Khrushchev. This came as a complete surprise to the majority of delegates present at the congress. The report revealed and condemned the facts of mass repressions sanctioned by Stalin, and revealed the truth about the deaths of many prominent figures of the party and state. As a result of Khrushchev's liberal attitude to the secrecy of the text of the report, within a few weeks its contents became known practically throughout the country.

From the report, the congress participants learned about Lenin’s “testament,” the existence of which had until then been denied by the party. The report analyzed Stalin’s perversion of the principle of democratic centralism, talked about purges and “illegal investigative methods” with the help of which absolutely incredible confessions were wrested from thousands of communists. Having debunked the myth of Stalin as the “heir” and “brilliant successor” of Lenin’s work, the report also attacked the myth of Stalin as a “warlord,” destroying the canonical image of the generalissimo and creating the image of an indecisive and incompetent man responsible for the crushing defeats of 1941-1942. The report also showed Stalin's responsibility for the deportation of the Caucasian peoples, who were indiscriminately accused of collaborating with the Germans, for the conflict with Tito, and the fabrication of false conspiracies in 1949 (the "Leningrad affair"), 1951 (the "Mingrelian affair") and 1953 ( "The Case of the Killer Doctors"). Khrushchev’s report painted a new image of Stalin - the image of a tyrant, day after day creating his own cult, the image of an incompetent dictator who did not want to listen to anyone, “cut off from the people” and responsible for the catastrophic economic situation of the country in 1953.

The report was filled with details that shocked the audience, but at the same time it certainly lacked clarity, and the information it contained was often approximate and incomplete.

The report brought Khrushchev, albeit a small, but still a victory in the struggle for power. When the roles were distributed in March 1953, Khrushchev was clearly “relegated to the background” and he was forced to take a wait-and-see attitude. However, after the activation of Beria, in whom Khrushchev saw a threat to his position, he (Khrushchev) began to act. The result of these efforts was the elimination of Beria, after which the solution to the issue of a sole leader remained only a matter of time. The next step was the elimination of Malenkov, Molotov and the hedgehog with them. One of the stages in eliminating them was precisely the “secret report” delivered at the congress.

Most party workers who made their careers under Stalin correctly understood that the process of de-Stalinization would be difficult to contain within the framework of the revelations made at the congress. The charismatic aura around Stalin began to slowly collapse, and the name and image of V.I. Lenin acquired more and more ideal, divine features. This, of course, was a blow to the foundations of the system. The conservative offensive began. On June 30, 1956, the CPSU Central Committee adopted a resolution “On overcoming the cult of personality and its consequences.” In it, the intensity of criticism against Stalin was reduced. It was argued that the mistakes he made “it goes without saying that they did not lead him astray the right way development towards communism." The resolution confirmed the correctness and inviolability of the line of the Communist Party, its right to undivided leadership of the country. In general, the assessment of the role of I.V. Stalin was high, but certain negative phenomena were also pointed out.

The word of truth about Stalin, spoken from the rostrum of the congress, came as a shock to contemporaries - regardless of whether the facts and assessments presented were a revelation to them or a long-awaited restoration of justice. Something unimaginable was happening in society and on the pages of the press. One discussion fed another, the wave of public activity became wider and deeper. There were some extreme performances. The political leadership was not prepared for such a scale of events.

However, Khrushchev was not the first who decided to attribute the mistakes of past years to Stalin, taking the Communist Party “from under attack.” Initially, the issue of the cult of personality was reduced only to the restructuring of propaganda, later - in July 1953, at the plenum of the Central Committee - it smoothly turned into a condemnation of Beria, saying that he was guilty of all sins. Stalin's "guilt", switched to Beria's "intrigues", received an out-of-system assessment, i.e. assessment not related to the laws of functioning of state power. Stalin was separated from Stalinism, the system from its carrier. All subsequent policies directed against the cult of Stalin were built on the basis of this division of concepts. It was a struggle with a name, a struggle with an idol, but not with the reasons that gave birth to it.

Thus, Khrushchev’s report, despite the dubiousness of such a political move and the lack of thought that led to tragic events, became the starting point for the process of controlled de-Stalinization.

Death of I.V. Stalin and the subsequent condemnation of certain aspects of his foreign and domestic policies, criticism of the “cult of personality and its consequences” had a huge impact on both the political system and social life countries. The new leaders, without encroaching on the fundamental principles of the socialist System that existed in the USSR, made an attempt to modernize it, reform it, abandoning those parts and elements that they considered either ineffective or simply superfluous.

The second half of the 30s was the stage of the formation of Stalinism and the politicization of culture. In the thirties and forties, the cult of personality and its negative impact on the development of culture reached its apogee, and a national model of totalitarianism emerged.

In general, the culture of totalitarianism was characterized by emphasized classism and partisanship, and the rejection of many universal ideals of humanism.

Adopted by the 20th Congress of the CPSU, they concerned the internal political sphere. It was announced that the rule of law and Leninist norms of intra-party life would be restored, and the rights of the union republics were expanded. The exposure of Stalin's personality cult and the identification of its origins began. This attempt was made in a report to the congress by N.S. Khrushchev (from September 1953 - First Secretary, and from March 1958 - including Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR) “On the cult of personality and its consequences”, presented to the delegates at a closed meeting, as well as in a special resolution adopted on September 30, 1956 Central Committee of the CPSU. Despite all the limited assessments of Stalin’s activities, the report had such an impact on the minds of party members, and then, despite its closed, secret nature, on broad sections of the Soviet people, that a return to a repressive regime of the Stalinist type was no longer possible. This information literally turned the entire public consciousness upside down and revealed, albeit only partially, the truth about Stalin’s crimes.

The report and special resolution of the Central Committee spoke about the “deformation” of socialism due to the personal qualities of Stalin’s character and the peculiarities of the post-revolutionary situation. Stalin's activity itself was divided into two stages.

The first is the period of struggle against the opposition, the time of industrialization, collectivization.

The Great Patriotic War was characterized as positive. The second, which received the name “period of the cult of personality,” was not clearly defined chronologically: either its beginning was pushed back to the second half of the 30s, or it was a question of life of the "leader". In any case, the exposure of Stalinism was carried out within the framework of the existing former socialist system, and therefore not only did not affect the essence of the totalitarian-bureaucratic system, but also to a certain extent hid its social nature, reducing all the vices of the system only to the cult of personality, to the characteristics of Stalin’s character. The cult of personality itself was perceived as a kind of historical accident, a deviation from the main historical development of socialist society.

Essentially speaking, it turned out that if Stalin had not existed, the cult of personality with all its negative consequences would not have existed in the history of our country.

Such a predominantly superficial analysis of this phenomenon in the life of our country greatly made it difficult to understand its deep roots and consider it in a complex of political, economic, psychological and moral connections. Therefore, the only task put forward was the “restoration of Leninist norms” in the actions of the party and the state. Such a limited explanation did not allow us to trace the organic connection of the “cult of personality” with the totalitarian-bureaucratic nature of the social system created by the party itself.

In any case, the condemnation of Stalin’s personality cult was the first step of future changes in all areas of the life of the Soviet people: the return from prisons and exile of hundreds of thousands of repressed people, including representatives of the creative intelligentsia, the weakening of the censorship press, the development of ties with foreign countries - all this expanded the spectrum freedom, caused the population, especially young people, to have utopian dreams of a better life.

From a moral point of view, it can be assessed as a fact of political courage both by N.S. Khrushchev himself and those communists who supported him.

Introduction. In 1953, after for long years existence of a totalitarian regime, called Stalinism by historians, a tyrant leader, a charismatic personality, his central link

, died. After a short struggle, Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev came to power.

Period from mid-1950s to mid-1960s. It is commonly called the "thaw". And indeed, after many years of existence of a monolithic authoritarian system, some shoots of liberalization began to emerge in society. Khrushchev personally played a significant role in this process.

The "thaw" period is extremely important in the history of the fatherland. This was the first blow to the system that had developed back in the 1920s. After the “Khrushchev period” there was a period of “stagnation”, which can be characterized as a return to old traditions. After “stagnation” came “perestroika” - the second major blow to the system, from which it was never able to recover. Of course, all its remnants have not yet been destroyed, but still, in general, the totalitarian communist system has ceased to exist. And the process of its decomposition began precisely in the mid-1950s.

But was the “thaw” really a thaw? After all, attempts at liberalization occurred with interruptions and inevitable setbacks. In this regard, it is interesting to take a closer look at this turbulent period in the history of the fatherland.

Criticism of Stalin's personality cult and its consequences.

According to Khrushchev, the party leaders found themselves after the arrest of Beria (July 10, 1953) in the face of so many revelations about the activities of the political police apparatus and falsified conspiracies that all of them, including Khrushchev, came to the conclusion that it was necessary to obtain more complete information. It was Khrushchev who was tasked with reading the report and personally meeting the unpredictable reaction of the congress participants. Nevertheless, Khrushchev played a decisive role and was a catalyst for the exposure - selective and controlled - of Stalin's crimes. On February 14, 1956, the 20th Congress of the CPSU opened in the Kremlin, bringing together 1,436 delegates, mostly experienced apparatchiks, as well as members of 55 “fraternal parties.” Convened eight months before the statutory deadline in connection with the urgent need to take stock of the changes that had taken place since Stalin's death and discussions about the choice of course, the congress ended with Khrushchev's famous “secret report”. February 25, 1956 - on the last day of the 20th Congress, at a closed meeting, the First Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee N.S. spoke with a report “On the cult of personality and its consequences”. Khrushchev. This came as a complete surprise to the majority of delegates present at the congress. The report revealed and condemned the facts of mass repressions sanctioned by Stalin, and revealed the truth about the deaths of many prominent figures of the party and state. As a result of Khrushchev's liberal attitude to the secrecy of the text of the report, within a few weeks its contents became known practically throughout the country.

The report was filled with details that shocked the audience, but at the same time it certainly lacked clarity, and the information it contained was often approximate and incomplete.

The report brought Khrushchev, albeit a small, but still a victory in the struggle for power. When the roles were distributed in March 1953, Khrushchev was clearly “relegated to the background” and he was forced to take a wait-and-see attitude. However, after the activation of Beria, in whom Khrushchev saw a threat to his position, he began to act. The result of these efforts was the elimination of Beria, after which the solution to the issue of a sole leader remained only a matter of time. The next step was the elimination of Malenkov, Molotov and the hedgehog with them. One of the stages in eliminating them was precisely the “secret report” delivered at the congress.

Most party workers who made their careers under Stalin correctly understood that the process of de-Stalinization would be difficult to contain within the framework of the revelations made at the congress. The charismatic aura around Stalin began to slowly collapse, and the name and image of V.I. Lenin acquired more and more ideal, divine features. This, of course, was a blow to the foundations of the system. The conservative offensive began. On June 30, 1956, the CPSU Central Committee adopted a resolution “On overcoming the cult of personality and its consequences.” In it, the intensity of criticism against Stalin was reduced. It was argued that the mistakes he made “it goes without saying that they did not lead him astray from the correct path of development towards communism.” The resolution confirmed the correctness and inviolability of the line of the Communist Party, its right to undivided leadership of the country. In general, the assessment of the role of I.V. Stalin was high, but some negative phenomena were also pointed out.

Of course, social unrest began in society. At first Stalin was idolized, people prayed for him, but now he has become a murderer and a tyrant. Shock! On March 5, 1956, a mass protest of students against the decisions of the 20th Congress began in Tbilisi. On March 9, tanks were brought into the city. A few months later, discontent also broke out within the “socialist camp”. And, if in Poland it was possible to reach an agreement, then in Hungary dissent was pacified with the help of troops.

The Tbilisi, Polish and Hungarian events are, so to speak, an indicator of the ill-considered nature of the entire anti-Stalin campaign. Having overthrown Stalin from his pedestal, Khrushchev at the same time removed the “halo of immunity” from the first person and his entourage in general. The system of fear was destroyed, but the seemingly unshakable belief that everything was clearer from above was greatly shaken.

All power structures remained the same, but this internal balance of interests A New Look on the leader, of course, violated. Now people had the right not only to expect changes for the better from the leadership, but also to demand them. Changing the situation from below created a special psychological background of impatience, which, on the one hand, stimulated the desire for decisive action by the authorities, but, on the other hand, increased the danger of transforming the course on reforms into propaganda populism. As subsequent events showed, it was not possible to avoid this danger.

All this simultaneously became a crisis of the new course of the Soviet leadership. After the Hungarian events, an “anti-party group”, an anti-Khrushchev opposition, gradually formed in it. Her open performance took place in June 1957. The plenum of the CPSU Central Committee that took place at the same time, at which the “oppositionists” (Molotov, Malenkov, Kaganovich, etc.) were defeated, put an end to the period of “collective leadership,” and Khrushchev, as First Secretary, became the sole leader. In 1958, when he took the post of Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, this process received its logical conclusion. Very important detail: Khrushchev’s enemies were not shot or imprisoned, as would have been the case under Stalin. Malenkov became director of the Siberian power plant, and Molotov was sent as ambassador to Mongolia. On the other hand, Zhukov, who played a decisive role in eliminating the anti-Khrushchev group, was also punished. He was removed from the Presidium and the Central Committee of the party.

But, in reality, Khrushchev was not the first who decided to attribute the mistakes of past years to Stalin, taking the Communist Party “from under attack.” Initially, the issue of the cult of personality was reduced only to the restructuring of propaganda, later - in July 1953, at the plenum of the Central Committee - it smoothly turned into a condemnation of Beria, saying that he was guilty of all sins. Stalin's "guilt", switched to Beria's "intrigues", received an out-of-system assessment, i.e. assessment not related to the laws of functioning of state power. Stalin was separated from Stalinism, the system from its carrier. All subsequent policies directed against the cult of Stalin were built on the basis of this division of concepts. It was a struggle with a name, a struggle with an idol, but not with the reasons that gave birth to it. 4

2. "Thaw" in the sphere of culture and its limits.

The “spirit of the 20th Congress” seemed to justify the wildest hopes, especially of the intelligentsia. In reality, the authorities' policy towards it soon showed the ambiguous and limited nature of liberalization "under enhanced supervision."

The most important consequence of Khrushchev's liberalization was a sharp increase in critical potential in Soviet society. Since the late 50s. In the Soviet Union, various ideological movements and informal public associations are formed and make themselves known, and public opinion is taking shape and strengthening.

So, already in 1953-1956. critic V. Pomerantsev in his essay “On Sincerity in Literature”, I. Ehrenburg in the novel “The Thaw” and M. Dudintsev in the novel “Not by Bread Alone” raised a number of important questions: what should be said about the past, what is the mission of the intelligentsia, what are its relationship with the party, what was the role of writers or artists in a system in which the party, through the “creative” Unions controlled by it, recognized (or not) this or that person as a writer or artist, how and why the truth gave way to lies everywhere. To these questions, which previously would have cost those who raised them at least several years in the camps, the authorities reacted hesitantly, oscillating between administrative measures (the removal of the poet Tvardovsky, who published Pomerantsev’s essay, from the leadership of Novy Mir) and warnings to Ministry of Culture.

In December 1954, a congress of the Writers' Union was held, at which Khrushchev's report on the cult of personality was discussed. According to Khrushchev, history, literature and other arts should reflect the role of Lenin, as well as the tremendous achievements of the Communist Party and the Soviet people. The directives were clear: the intelligentsia must adapt to the “new ideological course” and serve it. At the same time, all the blame for the past was placed on Beria and Zhdanov.

The intelligentsia split into two camps: conservatives, led by Kochetov, and liberals, led by Tvardovsky. Khrushchev balanced between these two camps, pursuing a dual policy. Conservatives received the magazines "October", "Neva", "Literature and Life"; liberals - " New world" and "Youth". Shostakovich, Khachaturian and other composers who were criticized in 1948-1949 restored their position.

These were the liberal steps in the field of culture. But the “Pasternak case” most clearly showed the limits of liberalism in the relationship between the authorities and the intelligentsia. In 1955, Pasternak published the novel Doctor Zhivago abroad. In 1958 he was given the Nobel Prize. The authorities were, of course, unhappy with this turn of affairs. To avoid deportation from the USSR, Pasternak had to refuse the prize and send a statement to Pravda in which he accused the West of using his work for political purposes. Sending the novel for publication abroad undermined the monopoly on the right to communicate with the outside world, which the authorities intended to retain for themselves.

Pasternak was charged with several standard charges, such as anti-Sovietism, contempt for the Russian people, unforgivable admiration of the West for material gain, etc. When the clash between Pasternak and the authorities forced the intelligentsia to openly make a choice, the latter surrendered. The majority of writers, convened on October 27, 1958 to decide on the expulsion of Pasternak from the Writers' Union, greeted the accusations made against the Nobel laureate with applause. The “Pasternak Affair” gave rise to a serious crisis in the consciousness of the Russian intelligentsia, which showed itself incapable of openly resisting the pressure of the authorities.

Satisfied with the outcome of the “case,” Khrushchev, for his part, stopped the attack on the liberals. Tvardovsky was returned to leadership of the New World. In May 1959, at the III Congress of the Writers' Union, Surkov, who had expressed particular zeal in the campaign against Pasternak, left the union; his place in the leadership of the Union was taken by Fedin, a representative of a more moderate trend. However, these measures turned out to be insufficient to smooth out the depressing impression caused by the “Pasternak affair” in the memory of intellectuals.

At the end of the 50s. "samizdat" arose - typewritten magazines born among young poets, writers, philosophers, historians who met on Saturdays on Mayakovsky Square in Moscow. Later, meetings were banned and “samizdat” went underground. It was from there that the first “samizdat” magazine “Syntax”, founded by A. Ginzburg, saw the light of day, in which the previously banned works of B. Akhmadulina, Vs. Nekrasov, B. Okudzhava, E. Ginzburg, V. Shalamov. For this, A. Ginzburg was arrested and sentenced to two years in the camps. But the dissidents could no longer be stopped, and others took up the baton of those arrested.

It is noteworthy that after the 22nd Congress, when Khrushchev again turned to criticizing Stalin’s personality cult, another “sip” was made to the intelligentsia. In November 1962, “with the knowledge and approval of the Central Committee,” A. I. Solzhenitsyn’s novel “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich” was published, and a month earlier, Pravda published E. Yevtushenko’s poem “Stalin’s Heirs.” But after the bloody drama in Novocherkassk and the Cuban missile crisis in the same 1962, Khrushchev, frightened by the deepening of de-Stalinization, which made this process difficult to control, decided to turn away from the liberal part of the intelligentsia and turn to conservatives.

Khrushchev instructed the Chairman of the Ideological Commission of the CPSU Central Committee, Ilyichev, to call on the intelligentsia to fulfill their duties. I. Ehrenburg and V. Nekrasov were sharply criticized; Khrushchev himself, in a speech on March 18, 2963, personally called on the intelligentsia to be guided in their work by the principle of party membership. This call put an end to the cultural thaw.

So, the process of concessions to the intelligentsia was combined with its pulling back. Khrushchev’s liberalization sometimes led to unexpected results that had to be stopped and brought back to the right direction, and such a pendulum in long term inevitably remains in place, although, on the other hand, a cumulative progressive movement forward, although small, still took place.

Exposing the “cult of personality” by I.V. Stalin- a campaign to revise the tendency to exalt the figure of I.V. Stalin by means of mass official propaganda, as well as in works of culture and art. The impetus for this campaign was given by the report “On the cult of personality and its consequences,” made by N. S. Khrushchev at the 20th Congress of the CPSU in 1956.

In anticipationXX congress

Since December 1929, when the 50th anniversary of J.V. Stalin was celebrated in the USSR with pomp, the exaltation of the Soviet leader has been an integral part of Soviet culture. The image of Stalin was central in literature, painting, sculpture, and cinema. His figure was glorified in the folklore of numerous peoples of the USSR. Cities, streets, various institutions and enterprises were named after the Leader. After the Great Patriotic War, Stalin's personality began to be glorified in countries where pro-Soviet communist regimes were established.

The first steps towards eliminating the consequences of repressive policies were taken soon after Stalin's death, in 1953. On March 10, 1953, G. M. Malenkov, at that time the de facto leader of the USSR, said that the “policy of the cult of personality” should be stopped. Already in April 1953, mentions of Stalin and references to his writings disappeared from the central press. According to the decision of the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee, sent to localities on the eve of May 1, 1953, at the May Day demonstration it was ordered not to use portraits of members of the CPSU Central Committee, including Stalin.

On November 5, 1955, members of the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee discussed the issue of “December 21,” that is, Stalin’s upcoming birthday. N.S. Khrushchev proposed to mark this date only in the press, and not to hold a ceremonial meeting. He was supported by M. G. Pervukhin and D. T. Shepilov, while L. M. Kaganovich and K. E. Voroshilov objected. N.A. Bulganin and A.I. Mikoyan agreed that there was no need to hold a meeting. G. M. Malenkov and V. M. Molotov were not present at the discussion. As a result, it was decided to publish articles dedicated to Stalin in the press and highlight his biography in radio broadcasts, as well as to coincide with the awarding of the Stalin Prizes on December 21.

On December 30, 1955, Khrushchev reported to the Presidium of the Central Committee on issues of rehabilitation of victims of repression. He proposed to find out how it became possible that the majority of members and candidates of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, elected by the 17th Party Congress, were repressed. On December 31, a commission was formed headed by the Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee P. N. Pospelov, which was to find out this. In addition to Pospelov, the commission included P. T. Komarov, A. B. Aristov, N. M. Shvernik. On February 9, members of the commission presented their conclusions at a meeting of the Presidium. It followed from them that in 1937-1938 more than 1.5 million Soviet and party leaders became victims of repression, of which 600 thousand were shot. According to Mikoyan, Pospelov, who was reading out the report, once “even burst into tears” - the facts given in the text were so terrifying. The commission's conclusion sparked a heated debate. Various proposals arose. Thus, Molotov agreed that at the 20th Congress of the CPSU it was necessary to criticize Stalin, but said that it was necessary to note positive sides his reign. Voroshilov and Kaganovich took a similar position. Ultimately, a report on Stalin’s personality cult was ordered to be made at a closed meeting of the congress. Khrushchev was supposed to speak with him.

Report onXXCongress of the CPSU

On February 14, 1956, the 20th Congress of the CPSU opened in the Kremlin in the presence of representatives of 55 foreign communist and workers' parties (except for the disgraced Yugoslav one). It brought together 1,436 delegates. The congress was convened eight months before the agreed date due to the need to take stock of the changes that took place in the country after Stalin's death, as well as to clarify the status of Stalin himself. Those present at that congress noted that in the hall, in its usual place, there was only a statue of Lenin - there was neither a portrait nor a photograph of Stalin nearby. Nevertheless, addressing the congress, Khrushchev called on those gathered to honor the memory of Stalin and at the same time two more “prominent figures of the communist movement” who died during the break between the 19th and 20th congresses - the leaders of the Czechoslovak and Japanese Communist Parties K. Gottwald and K. Tokuda. The congress held meetings for ten days, and on February 25 it completed its work. On that day, at a closed meeting of the congress, in the absence of foreign delegates, the First Secretary of the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee N. S. Khrushchev made a “secret report.” Eyewitnesses recalled that there was complete silence in the hall. At the end of Khrushchev’s speech, N.A. Bulganin proposed dispensing with debates and questions on the report, after which the congress delegates adopted resolutions approving the provisions of the report and distributing it to party organizations without publication in the press.

The report condemned the “cult of personality of Stalin” based on the views of the classics of Marxism, who opposed the “cult of the individual.” Lenin's political testament was quoted - the famous "Letter to the Congress", whose existence the party still did not recognize - and the statements of N.K. Krupskaya about the personality of Stalin. Stalin's disregard for the rules of collective leadership, mass repressions and deportations, and exaggeration of Stalin's role in the USSR's victory in the Great Patriotic War were criticized. Patriotic War and other manifestations of the exaltation of the Leader (names of cities, changing the text of the anthem, replacing the Lenin Prize with the Stalin Prize, and so on). If we believe the text of Khrushchev’s speech that has reached us, he accused Stalin of “delusions of grandeur” and called the praise addressed to the Leader “sickeningly flattering.” Khrushchev’s son Sergei recalled that after the speech, returning home, his father looked very tired, but at the same time very happy: he “just beamed.”

Reaction to Khrushchev's report

After the congress, the report “On the Cult of Personality and Its Consequences” was heard by 7 million communists and 18 million Komsomol members. In Tbilisi, its content caused mass protests. On March 5-7, student marches took place in the city with the laying of wreaths at the monument to Stalin, and on March 8, a crowd besieged the building of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Georgia and demanded that portraits of Stalin be hung in Tbilisi. The next day, a rally of 80,000 people took place in the center of the Georgian capital, where there were calls to rehabilitate Beria and remove Khrushchev, and even statements in favor of Georgia’s secession from the USSR. As a result, the meeting was dispersed, several dozen people were arrested by the KGB, and many were sentenced to prison terms.

Regional and republican party activists wondered what to do with the visual propaganda dedicated to Stalin. Many local party leaders were perplexed, not knowing how to convey to the population the new official view of Stalin’s rule. Rumors about the contents of the report also reached ordinary citizens: they learned about Khrushchev’s speech at the 20th Congress from familiar party workers, thanks to foreign radio stations. In fact, there was no talk about the secrecy of the report; its text was simply not published officially. The reaction was ambiguous: those whose relatives and friends were repressed rejoiced and rejoiced. Many experienced a feeling of disappointment in Stalin. Part of the population, on the contrary, refused to believe the accusations against the late Leader. Those who agreed with Khrushchev's report developed personal sympathy for him and opposed him to the cruel Stalin. Someone, on the contrary, wondered where Khrushchev himself and other members of the Presidium were when Stalin committed all these crimes. Already in April 1956, the KGB began to receive reports of cases of unauthorized demolition of monuments and busts of Stalin. At some meetings there were calls to remove Stalin's body from the Mausoleum.

On June 30, 1956, the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee issued a resolution “On overcoming the cult of personality and its consequences,” which outlined the scope of acceptable criticism of Stalin’s cult of personality. The resolution was a shortened version of Khrushchev's report. It was sent to managers communist parties abroad. IN THE USSR full version The report was officially published only in 1989. However, most of the leaders of foreign communist and workers' parties heard the report on the night of February 25-26 from the lips of Soviet diplomats. Many of them were shocked by what they heard. The leaders of the Albanian and Chinese Communist Parties E. Hoxha and Zhou Enlai, on the day when the report was read out, left the 20th Congress early in protest without waiting for the closing ceremony. De-Stalinization had a decisive impact on the relations between the USSR and Albania: the dialogue between the countries quickly came to naught, and Albania left the orbit of Soviet influence for decades.

Measures for “de-Stalinization”

In January 1957, the rehabilitation of those involved in the case of Marshal Tukhachevsky and other prominent military leaders was announced. The cases of Zinoviev, Kamenev and Bukharin, however, were not reviewed - the commission headed by Molotov decided that they “conducted anti-Soviet activities.”

The peak of the fight against the “cult of personality” came in 1961. Then, at the XXII Congress of the CPSU, decisions were made regarding the removal of Stalin’s body from the Mausoleum (it was decided to bury him on Red Square) and regarding the renaming of Stalingrad to Volgograd. Other cities named after the former leader of the USSR were also subject to renaming: Stalinabad became Dushanbe, Stalino - Donetsk, Staliniri - Tskhinvali, Stalinsk - Novokuznetsk. Stalin's name disappeared from the names of cities in countries of Eastern Europe: Stalinvaros (Hungary) was renamed back to Dunaujvaros, Orasul-Stalin (Romania) - to Brasov and so on. Many monuments to Stalin, including abroad, for example, in Prague, were dismantled. Movies were censored: scenes with Stalin were cut out or shortened.

Consequences and assessments

With the coming to power of L. I. Brezhnev in October 1964, the topic of exposing Stalin’s “cult of personality” began to be hushed up, since, according to the authorities, it could undermine the foundations of the socialist system. These sentiments persisted among the intelligentsia, especially among dissidents. In February 1966, 25 prominent figures in science, literature and art of the USSR addressed the General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Brezhnev with a letter, which stated the inadmissibility of “partial or indirect rehabilitation of Stalin” and the need to make public the “truly terrible facts” of his crimes. The country's leadership distanced itself from the topic of Stalin's “cult of personality” until the beginning of “perestroika.”

The American biographer of Khrushchev, W. Taubman, notes that he kept silent about a lot at the 20th Congress, and stated a lot in specific formulations. Thus, Khrushchev declared his sympathy not for all of Stalin’s victims, but only for the undeservedly repressed communists. Lenin, during whose reign terror and repression also took place in the country, Khrushchev opposed Stalin and even accused the latter of betraying Lenin. Despite this, Taubman calls Khrushchev's speech at the congress "the most reckless and most courageous act of his life." M. S. Gorbachev said the same thing on the fortieth anniversary of the report, at that time already ex-president THE USSR. He expressed admiration for Khrushchev's "political courage" and determination.

IN modern Russia, in view of the extreme polarity in assessments of the personality and activities of I.V. Stalin himself, the campaign to debunk Stalin’s “cult of personality” and specifically Khrushchev’s report at the 20th Congress are assessed ambiguously. Most experts agree that Khrushchev’s accusations against Stalin were generally fair, but they criticize him for shifting all the blame for repressions, deportations and other negative aspects of the period of his rule onto Stalin alone. There is also an opinion that one of the main goals of the “secret report” was to intimidate opponents in the party leadership who were previously close to Stalin, such as Voroshilov, Kaganovich, Molotov, Malenkov.

Historical sources

Report by N. S. Khrushchev on Stalin’s personality cult at the 20th Congress of the CPSU: Documents. M., 2002.