ABSTRACT
With the ending of the war in eastern Europe a series of new governments came to power calling themselves ‘Popular Democracies’. They differed from the Soviet Union, in the wake of whose Red Army they had sprung up, in including at first a wide range of political parties, only the prewar rightists being excluded, and in permitting small private enterprise. And they differed far more sharply from such countries as Sweden, and Britain while under the Labour Government, in the sweep of their nationalization and land reform practices and the scope and authority of their planning. This difference is characteristic and unmistakable from the outset. For some time, however, it was not clear how rapid their march to further socialization would be. There was much talk in Western circles of the hope of their reversing their trend. There is also considerable evidence that within the countries the leadership of the leftmost elements at that time, the Communist parties, exerted a restraining influence upon their members and others to hold back from exploiting the revolutionary possibilities of the situation. Their argument was that an unprecedentedly peaceful and exceedingly gradual transition to socialism was now possible, owing to changed world conditions.
