Introduction

Ideological change is a central feature of the reform campaign known as perestroika which Mikhail Gorbachev hopes will revitalize the economy and society of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). A great deal of rethinking reflects pressures for ideological adaptation and revision which substantially predate Gorbachev’s ascendancy, and which may be understood as the intellectual dimension of the contemporary crisis in Soviet society. The complexity and scale of the reform process underway in the USSR admit many interpretations of the meaning and prospects of ideological change. Marxism-Leninism is neither meaningless rhetoric nor the only source of ideas for the Soviet political system. The patterns of ideological change in Soviet history have varied with the degree of discipline being enforced, and the urgency of perceived pressures for change. The process of ideological change in the USSR is far from over, and the fate of its many components is impossible to forecast with certainty.