Family History

Chapter 4 reviews how today’s Russian bourgeoisie traces its origins and character traits with reference to family history. The Soviet government pursued a policy of positive discrimination in favor of working-class and peasant families in order to form a new Soviet intelligentsia and, on the other hand, discriminated against former privileged groups from the aristocracy, merchant class, and clergy. Many individuals from these politically repressed families survived thanks to marriage into the new ruling elite and were able to transmit to their offspring certain practices and important cultural resources, such as an eagerness to learn. Stalin’s purges were disastrous for the reconstituted Soviet intelligentsia and meant that robust family bonds were vital for protection in the postwar period. During these decades the Soviet intelligentsia coalesced to form what Norbert Elias described as the good society, which continues to provide a model for bourgeois practices and values today.