Castro’s cuba in gorbachev’s era

Abstract

Those who expected that the statist system would perish the moment it entered the ideological impasse of mendacious consciousness were mistaken. Even ideologically defunct systems can continue to exist, especially if the international constellation of forces is favorable to them. If the official ideology of Marxism-Leninism loses influence, it does not mean that the statist system cannot have a different kind of ideological support. As an example, there is ideology of the "lesser evil." True, this ideology in itself does not have enough strength to make possible a return from mendacious to distorted consciousness. Reliance on the victory in World War II, superpower status, and, generally, the patriotism of Soviet citizens is usually treated in the literature as a secondary ideology. Why is it not primary, since this ideology de facto is no less impor tant for the system's legitimization than Marxism-Leninism? After all, in the USSR, Soviet patriotism is officially regarded as a component of Marxism-Leninism and not as something separate from it. Precisely those generations for whom the experience of World War II remains decisive still set the tone of social life in the USSR. These generations have a feeling (almost religious) of the sacred obligation toward the compatr iots who fell in the war. []