Eurocommunism

Eurocommunism
Eurocommunist, n., adj.
/yoor'euh kom"yeuh niz'euhm, yerr'-/, n.
a form of Communism that developed in some western European nations independently of the Soviet Union.
[1970-75; EURO- + COMMUNISM]

* * *

Trend among European communist parties toward independence from Soviet Communist Party doctrine in the 1970s and '80s.

The term, coined in the mid-1970s, received wide publicity after the publication of Santiago Carrillo's Eurocommunism and the State (1977). The Eurocommunist movement rejected the Soviet doctrine of one monolithic world communist movement and advocated instead that each country's communist party base its policies on the traditions and needs of its own country. With Mikhail Gorbachev's encouragement, all communist parties took independent courses in the late 1980s. Most of the European communist parties declined after the breakup of the Soviet Union.

* * *

      trend among European communist parties toward independence from Soviet Communist Party (Communist Party of the Soviet Union) doctrine during the 1970s and '80s. With Mikhail Gorbachev's (Gorbachev, Mikhail) encouragement, all communist parties took independent courses in the late 1980s, and by 1990 the term Eurocommunism had become moot.

      The term Eurocommunism was coined in the mid-1970s and received wide publicity after the publication of Eurocommunism and the State (1977) by the Spanish communist leader Santiago Carrillo. A spirit of independence among nonruling communist parties had already appeared, however, shortly before World War II with the growth of Popular Fronts in socialist politics and was afforded dramatic encouragement by the example of Josip Broz Tito's Yugoslavia from 1948 on. The excesses of Joseph Stalin's regime and such Soviet repressions as the crackdown in Hungary in 1956 and the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 alienated many communists in the Western countries and tended to accelerate the movement toward independent policies and autonomy.

      The Eurocommunist movement avowedly rejected the subordination of all communist parties to the once-prevalent Soviet doctrine of one monolithic world communist movement. Instead, every party was expected to base its policies on the traditions and needs within its own country. The promotion of Eurocommunism seemed to coincide with the stagnation or decline of many European communist parties. Notably, in France the once-powerful French Communist Party, which in the early postwar era was able to command about a third of the French popular vote, experienced a severe decline in later years. Its leader Georges Marchais and his comrades briefly flirted with Eurocommunism in the late 1970s—without any popular success. On the other hand, the Italian Communist Party (Democrats of the Left) remained Italy's second largest party, partly by stressing its independence of Moscow. Its foreign contacts and sympathies seemed to lie more with the European social democrats and labour parties, and in 1991 it changed its name to Democratic Party of the Left (shortened to Democrats of the Left in 1998). After the democratic revolutions of 1989, almost all the communist parties of eastern Europe became social democratic parties in spirit or name. Eurocommunism, in effect, had become the norm.

* * *


Universalium. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем написать реферат

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Eurocommunism — was a new trend in the 1970s and 1980s within various Western European communist parties to develop a theory and practice of social transformation that was more relevant in a Western European democracy and less aligned to the partyline of the… …   Wikipedia

  • Eurocommunism — [yoor΄ō käm′yə niz΄əm] n. a former policy of some western European Communist parties stressing their independence from the Soviet Union, support of democratic political procedures, etc. Eurocommunist adj., n …   English World dictionary

  • Eurocommunism —    A briefly important school of Marxism that flourished in the 1970s, but which had effectively ceased to exist by the early 1980s. The movement and its ideas are primarily associated with the three largest European communist parties of the time …   Historical dictionary of Marxism

  • eurocommunism — eurokomunizmas statusas T sritis Politika apibrėžtis Vakarų Europos šalių (Ispanijos, Italijos, Prancūzijos) komunistų partijų ideologija ir politika; atsisakoma revoliucinės politikos, proletariato diktatūros koncepcijos, pripažįstamas politinis …   Politikos mokslų enciklopedinis žodynas

  • Eurocommunism — noun Date: 1976 the communism especially of western European Communist parties that was marked by a willingness to reach power through coalitions and by independence from Soviet leadership • Eurocommunist noun or adjective …   New Collegiate Dictionary

  • Eurocommunism — noun a European form of communism which advocates the preservation of many elements of Western liberal democracy. Derivatives Eurocommunist adjective &noun …   English new terms dictionary

  • eurocommunism — eu·ro·communism …   English syllables

  • Eurocommunism — Eu•ro•com•mu•nism [[t]ˌyʊər əˈkɒm yəˌnɪz əm, ˌyɜr [/t]] n. gov a form of Communism that developed in some western European nations independently of the Soviet Union • Etymology: 1970–75 …   From formal English to slang

  • eurocommunism — n. a form of Communism in Western European countries that is independent of the Soviet Communist Party. Derivatives: Eurocommunist adj. & n …   Useful english dictionary

  • ЕВРОКОММУНИЗМ — (eurocommunism) термин, обозначающий политические изменения, которые произошли в коммунистических партиях Западной Европы (особенно французской, итальянской, испанской и британской) в течение 1970 х гг., включая разработку национальных,… …   Большой толковый социологический словарь

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”