ABSTRACT
In the first two decades after the fall of Nikita Khrushchev, the principal vehicle of the Soviet Human Rights Movement was the concept of the integrity of the individual.2 This led to a revolt against the collectivist principles of the socialist regime, with an emphasis on glasnost, human dignity, freedom of expression and respect for the constitution. This was not a conceptual framework that grew out of ideas imported from the West. Indeed, to search for a philosophical and conceptual framework in the early days of the movement’s formation is difficult.3 For many, its beginnings can be traced to a simple but remarkably strong intuitive reaction to the moral ugliness of the Soviet regime. For the majority of the Soviet scientific and literary intelligentsia-the content of their protest was aesthetic and ethical rather than political-it was directed against a regime that persisted in persecuting individuals who were struggling to live out their independent lives.
