Abstract
This article is based on previously unpublished sources, mainly the archival materials of the Party Control Commission of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). I argue that luxury can be seen as a phenomenon constructed by the Soviet social and political hierarchy during the 1940s and 1950s. An examination of everyday practices and patterns of consumption of luxury goods (food, clothing, interior furnishings, etc.) indicates that the Soviet elite (nomenklatura) sought to emulate a notional “middle-class” lifestyle. The distribution of so-called “trophy items” imported from East Germany to the Soviet Union caused friction within the party administration and sowed discontent within Soviet society as a whole. The dual policy of the CPSU on the issue of financial security of its members revealed its uncertainty about the state of “permitted” and “unauthorized” luxury.
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