BOOKS
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among whom "responsibility" is diffused? Why does anyone interpret
the situation as demanding some concrete performance from him? Will
such psychological pressures, though variant in form, inevitably arise
when there is an effort to speed capital formation among peoples
previously "unreformed"?
Soviet Attitudes Toward Authority
provides only the bare clues
to such mysteries. It argues that, increasingly, those who take Soviet
ideals seriously are punished by their conscience for the measures they
must take to keep afloat, and by their bureaucratic competitors if they
fail to take such measures. But the book carefully avoids a judgment
as to what proportion of the population are disciplined new-model
citizens, and what proportion have resignedly accommodated themselves
to contradictions which no longer strike them as moral dilemmas. Dr.
Mead suggests that the answer of the Politburo to all such problems is
simply to intensify the powers of the political police, powers whose
exercise cannot fail to dampen the residues of enthusiasm in the
population at large.
There are many themes in the closely packed book (including a
thoughtful explanation of the purge trials), and I have touched on
only a few. The tone of the book, apart from the fascinating quotations
from 'Soviet literature and informants, is factual and even dry; in its
I
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I
After the Lost
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A Critical Study of the
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charged with fresh, shrewd, and
provocative judgment."
-RICHARD SULLIVAN,
Chicago Tribune
-"A really important book of
criticism." -WILLIAM BARRETT,
Saturday Review of Literature
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