countries on state ownership, centralized planning, and economic
autarky. The persistence of the leaders of these countries in stubbornly
following an unsuccessful course of action was presented as proof
that the communist agenda was first and foremost “the product of
ideology.”^57
The international situation was obviously viewed differently from
the left of the political spectrum, although progressives, it must be
acknowledged, proved far more divided than the right on the East–
West conflict. Communists, Maoists, socialists, and social-democrats
proposed divergent analyses of the Cold War, and they could not rally
on a theme as strong as the defense of the free world was for con-
servatives. Nevertheless, the postwar progressive movement shared a
number of common features, among which the most significant was
undoubtedly the appeal of the Soviet model.
It is easy to forget, twenty years after the communist camp col-
lapsed under the weight of its political and economic contradictions,
that the Soviet Union was for decades a nuclear superpower, which
played a potent role in defining the orientations of the global left. The
influence of the USSR was especially strong in Eastern Europe, but
its reach extended far beyond that part of the world. China and other
developing countries where communists came to power (North Korea,
Cuba, Mongolia, Vietnam, and Cambodia) were also part of the
Soviet-led socialist system. The Soviet government also maintained
close ties with non-ruling communist parties, as well as with numer-
ous national liberation movements, many of which came to power. In
1962, the Sino-Soviet split demonstrated the limits of socialist soli-
darity, but the fact remains that at a certain time, about one third of
humanity lived under the banner of Marxism-Leninism.
Communist orthodoxy as laid down by the Soviet authorities defined
the postwar period as one of transition from capitalism to socialism.
Within that process the East represented the forces of progress, and
the West those of reaction. In accordance with the objective laws of
social development, the crisis of imperialism and of state monopoly
capitalism would inevitably engender a world revolution led by the
working class. The decline of capitalism appeared unavoidable because
the economic growth of the most advanced countries rested “upon
(^57) Kennan, “The Sources of Soviet Conduct,” p. 566.
The age of universality (1945–1980) 125