Russian America and the USSR: Striking Parallels

In: Politeia: journal for the political sciences, Band 39, Heft 2

Abstract

This article is devoted to a comparative analysis of the socioeconomic systems that have formed in the Russian colonies in Alaska and in the USSR. The author shows how these systems evolved and names the main reason for their similarity: the nature of the predominant type of property. In both systems, supreme state property dominated and, in this way, they can be designated as politaristic. Politarism (from the Greek ????????—the power of the majority, that is, in a broad sense, the state, the political system) is formation founded on the state's supreme ownership of the basic means of production and the work force. Economic relations of politarism generated the corresponding social structure, administrative management, ideological culture, and even similar psychological features in Russian America and the USSR.