Political culture & political change in communist state/ edited by Archie Brown and Jack Gray

In this pioneeting book, the authors use a commonly-agreed framework of analysis focusing on the concept of political culture to undertake a comparative study of Commung states. They show not only how the application of the concept of political culture may enhance understanding of continuity and change within particular Communist societies but also how it may help to explain the differences between one Communist society and another. By making extensive use of primary sources in the languages of the societies studied (including surveys which have sometimes been published only in very small editions in their country of origin), they synthesise such 'hard' social scientific data as are available,

An introductory chapter by Archie Brown sets out the framework of analysis and counters various criticisms of the concept of political culture. In subsequent chapters, there are studies of the following seven Communist states, all of which have at some time presented a distinctive model of Communism. the Soviet Unton, Yugoslavia, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, China and Cuba. In the final chapter Jack Gray draws together some important conclusions. As the first comparative chempirical study of Communist political

ares, this book has a significance for the bate among social scientists Ga the status of political culture as well as for sents of ommunist societies. Among other things, the book shows the relative independence of political culture from institutional power and the striking failure of Communist processes of education and political socialisation, in spite of the formidable advantages and institutional contrails in the hands of the party leaderships