On the Origin of Some of the Characteristics of the Soviet Party Community. A Subject of the Stalinist Regime and "Self-Criticism" in the 1930s

This article discusses two important effects of the 1928 slogan "criticism and self-criticism" on the Soviet public sphere in the 1930s: the social practice of individual repentance and the transformation of the public sphere into a refined space of denun ciation. The author emphasizes the difference between oppositionists' individual declarations of repentance and the collective "self-criticism", which, having spread in the wake of the defeat of the opposition, came to engulf the entire Soviet society as a "method of Bolshevist education" and of fighting various shortcomings. Later on, however, both phenomena merged into a single social practice, which was at odds with the original meaning of "selfcriticism". Noting the impracticability of the ideal of "self-criticism", the author points out the Stalinist nature of the corresponding ethics: being unable to fulfil this ideal and not knowing how to bring the call for "criticism" in accordance with the official ideology in each given case, citizens were forced to play "Soviet roulette" trying to anticipate the unpredictable politics of the party. The main function of the "self-criticism" discourse is seen in the transformation of the political public sphere into a zone of mutual control, ensuring the lasting authority of the regime.