Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-29T07:47:27.905Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Intimidation and the Symbolic Uses of Terror in the USSR

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

Donna Bahry  and
Brian D. Silver
Donna Bahry
Affiliation:
New York University
Brian D. Silver
Affiliation:
Michigan State University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Theories of regime-society relations in Communist states stress the central role of coercion in maintaining political control. Based on a survey of Soviet emigrants, we examine whether Soviet citizens are deterred from nonconformity by the punitive actions of the KGB (individual deterrence), a perception of the KGB's coercive potential (general deterrence), or mistrust of other people. We find that few respondents were directly coerced by the KGB (and those who were had engaged in the most serious kinds of nonconformity); that those who had punitive contacts with the KGB in the past were not deterred from subsequent nonconformity; that the KGB's competent image was a general deterrent; and that trust in other people facilitated both nonconformist and compliant political activism. Those who came of political age under Khrushchev and Brezhnev were more likely to be involved in both kinds of activism than those who came of age under Stalin.

Type
Articles
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 81 , Issue 4 , December 1987 , pp. 1064 - 1098
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1987

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Almond, Gabriel A., and Verba, Sidney. 1963. The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Anderson, Barbara, and Silver, Brian D.. 1987a. The SIP General Survey Sample. In Politics, Work, and Daily Life in the USSR: A Survey of Former Soviet Citizens, ed. Millar, James R.. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Anderson, Barbara A., and Silver, Brian D.. 1987b. The Validity of Survey Responses: Insights from Interviews of Married Couples in a Survey of Soviet Emigrants. Social Forces. Forthcoming.Google Scholar
Azrael, Jeremy. 1962. Is Coercion Withering Away? Problems of Communism 11:9–17.Google Scholar
Bahry, Donna. 1985. Surveying Soviet Ernigrants: Political Attitudes and Ethnic Bias. New York University. Typescript.Google Scholar
Bahry, Donna. 1987. Politics, Generations and Change in the USSR. In Politics, Work, and Daily Life in the USSR, ed. Millar, James R.. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Bialer, Seweryn. 1986. The Soviet Paradox. New York: Knopf.Google Scholar
Brzezinski, Zbigniew. 1956. The Permanent Purge. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Dallin, Alexander, and Breslauer, George. 1970. Political Terror in Communist Systems. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Fainsod, Merle. 1961. How Russia Is Ruled. Rev. ed. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Friedgut, Theodore H. 1979. Political Participation in the USSR. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Friedrich, Carl, and Brzezinski, Zbigniew. 1965. Totalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy. 2d ed. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Gurr, Ted. 1968. A Causal Model of Civil Strife: A Comparative Analysis Using New Indices. American Political Science Review 62:1104–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hazard, John N. 1983. Managing Change in the USSR: The Politico-legal Role of the Soviet Jurist. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Hough, Jerry F. 1980. Soviet Leadership in Transition. Washington: Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Jahoda, Marie, and Cook, Stuart. 1954. Ideological Compliance as a Social-Psychological Process. In Totalitarianism, ed. Friedrich, Carl. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Knight, Amy. 1980. The Powers of the Soviet KGB. Survey 25:138–55.Google Scholar
Kornhauser, William. 1959. The Politics of Mass Society. Glencoe, IL: Free Press.Google Scholar
Millar, James R. 1986. The Soviet Interview Project: History, Method, and the Problem of Bias. Soviet Interview Project Working Paper No. 19. University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Typescript.Google Scholar
Moore, Barrington Jr. 1954. Terror and Progress USSR: Some Sources of Change and Stability in the Soviet Dictatorship. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Piliavin, Irving, Thornton, Craig, Gartner, Rosemary, and Matsueda, Ross L.. 1986. Crime, Deterrence, and Rational Choice. American Sociological Review 51:101–19.Google Scholar
Reddaway, Peter. 1983. Dissent in the Soviet Union. Problems of Communism 32:1–15.Google Scholar
Rosenberg, Morris. 1956. Misanthropy and Political Ideology. American Sociological Review 21:690–95.Google Scholar
Rosenberg, Morris. 1957. Misanthropy and Attitudes toward International Affairs. Journal of Conflict Resolution 1:340–45.Google Scholar
Schelling, Thomas C. 1963. The Strategy of Conflict. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Shtromas, Alexander. 1984. Dissent and Political Change in the Soviet Union. In The Soviet Polity in the Modern Era, ed. Hoffman, Erik P. and Laird, Robin F.. New York: Aldine.Google Scholar
Silver, Brian D. 1987. Political Beliefs of the Soviet Citizen: Sources of Support for Regime Norms. In Politics, Work, and Daily life in the USSR, ed. Millar, James R.. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Swafford, Michael, Zeiss, Carol A., Breda, Carolyn S., and Bullock, Bradley P.. 1987. Response Effects in SIP's General Survey of Soviet Emigrants. In Politics, Work, and Daily Life in the USSR, ed. Millar, James R.. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
von Hirsch, Andrew. 1976. Doing Justice: The Choice of Punishments. New York: Hill & Wang.Google Scholar
Zimmerman, William. 1987. Mobilized Participation and the Nature of the Soviet Dictatorship. In Politics, Work, and Daily Life in the USSR, ed. Millar, James R.. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.