Despite its key role in the intellectual shaping of state socialism, Communist ideas are often dismissed as mere propaganda or as a rhetorical exercise aimed at advancing socialist intellectuals on their way to power. By drawing attention to unknown and unexplored areas, trends and ways of thinking under socialism, the volume examines Eastern Europe and Russian histories of intellectual movements inspired - negatively as well as positively - by Communist arguments and dogmas. Through an interdisciplinary dialogue, the collection demonstrates how various bodies of theoretical knowledge (philosophical, social, political, aesthetic, even theological) were used not only to justify dominant political views, but also to frame oppositional and nonofficial discourses and practices. The examination of the underlying structures of Communism as an intellectual project provides convincing evidence for questioning a dominant approach that routinely frames the post-Communist intellectual development as a 'revival' or, at least, as a 'return' of the repressed intellectual traditions. As the book shows, the logic of a radical break, suggested by this approach, is in contradiction with historical evidence: a significant number of philosophical, theoretical and ideological debates in post-Communist world are in fact the logical continuation of intellectual conversations and confrontations initiated long before 1989.

Costica Bradatan is assistant professor in the Honors College at Texas Tech University. Serguei Alex Oushakine is assistant professor of Slavic Languages and Literature and associate faculty in the Department of Anthropology at Princeton University.

Chapter 1 IntroductionPart 2 I. The Sickle, the Hammer and the TypewriterChapter 3 1) Ideas against Ideocracy: The Platonic Drama of Russian ThoughtChapter 4 2) Asking for More: Finding Utopia in the Critical Sociology of the Budapest School and the Praxis MovementChapter 5 3) Aesthetics: a Modus Vivendi in East Central Europe?Chapter 6 4) Changing Perceptions of Pavel Florensky in Russian and Soviet ScholarshipPart 7 II. HereticsChapter 8 5) The Totalitarian Languages of Utopia and Dystopia: Fidelius and HavelChapter 9 6) Martyrdom and Philosophy. The Case of Jan PatockaChapter 10 7) Anti-Communist Orientalism: Shifting Boundaries of Europe in Dissident WritingPart 11 III. In Search of a (New) MissionChapter 12 8) Vitality Rediscovered: Theorizing Post-Soviet Ethnicity in RussiaChapter 13 9) Balkanism and postcolonilaism or on the Beauty of the Airplane ViewChapter 14 10) Anxious Intellectuals: Framing the Nation as a class in BelarusPart 15 IV. Reinventing HopeChapter 16 11) The Demise of Leninism and the Future of Liberal ValuesChapter 17 12) "Politics of Authenticity" and/or Civil SocietyChapter 18 13) Mihai Sora: A Philosopher of Dialogue and Hope