[Maxim Litvinov]

I have been reading a study of a Moscow building of the 1930s recently which is nicely written. One particular section I liked was the following which is under the title 'The Performance of Stalinism' a bit way through. Basically, the author attempts a study of socialism, particularly under Stalin, through looking at material culture, official pronouncements on it, directives for it, and the material conditions of everyday life (bit). Then comes this nice discussion of the manner by which some form of 'control' was exercised under Stalinism - a rather interesting paradox...

The excerpt is from pp. 110-112 of Victor Buchli's An Archaeology of Socialism. Apologies for any errors - I scanned this text in and some of the OCR work may have been less than satisfactory...

"
Like Groy's 'total art', and Kotkin's 'speaking Bolshevik', Bourdieu's
understanding of the totalising and diffuse nature of habitus, with its
attendant demands on performative competence, becomes particularly
relevant to the performance of socialism.
Thus, in light of the totalising enterprise conducted by the Com-
munist Party in the spirit of 'democratic centralism', the socialist
habitus (to follow Bourdieu) comprised a broad field of doxic know-
ledge. However as Kotkin pointed out, not everyone actually knew what
comprised socialist doxa or the nature of the socialist habitus (Kotkin
1995). (Kotkin neglects to point out, however, that this was not for
want of trying; rather it was a unique attribute of the Stalinist state
that deliberately inhibited this process.) Yet because of the totalising
nature of the socialist enterprise, everyone ought to have known. This
impulse towards doxic certainty was what created a climate wherein
legitimacy was anchored in the mastery of a habitus. Yet, no one was
completely certain of it. In fact, the rise of Stalinism ensured that it
was uncertain, whilst nonetheless retaining the impulse towards cert-
ainty. Thus in contrast to Bourdieu's understanding of the totalitarian
state, absolute power was not ensured by the explicit restructuring of
habitus according to a fixed and knowable set of doxic assumptions.
Rather, power was ensured by demanding doxic certainty without the
certainty of a mediating habitus. Thus, the supreme authority of the
Communist Party, as embodied in Stalin himself and his appointed
agents, could arbitrate the habitus appropriate to realise socialist doxa,
contingently locally, and with devastating authority.
A certain element of 'fuzziness' therefore becomes necessary for
the participation of society as a whole in the enactment of social
performance. This relative 'fuzziness' of performative strategies, in
Bourdieu's words, would 'allow one to introduce just enough logic for
the needs of practical behaviour, neither too much - since a certain
vagueness is often indispensable, especially in negotiations - nor too
little since, life would then become impossible' (Bourdieu 1990a:73;
se also 1990b:13,87). Similarly, as in the case of Stalinism, the terms
by which socialism could be performed were deliberately 'fuzzy' in order
to permit a greater deal of social participation which empowered
individual agents locally and contingently, at the expense of the fixed
denotative doxic knowledge characteristic of the modernist Leninist
state. Elsewhere, John Bowen argues in the case of Gayo ritual in
Sumatra that such 'fuzziness' ensures social cohesion wherein a myth
of social egalitarianism predominates (Bowen 1994:86). As regards the
Stalinist state, this requirement was paramount to state legitimacy based
on the enfranchisement of the proletariat.
As Kotkin points out, the industrialisation drive and capitalist
encirclement required the strictest adherence to and actualisation of
socialist doxa. Yet no one was allowed to develop a consistent and
dominant habitus towards this end, which meant it could be anything.
However, doxic certainty required that a habitus must be something
particularly defined, especially under such stressed conditions. Within
such a climate, the need to demonstrate one's mastery of socialist
habitus (that is, perform socialism as best one could) was imperative.
How that was achieved was fundamentally arbitrary. There were no
attempts at guidelines as during the Cultural Revolution. Socialist
performance had been made 'fuzzy' to permit the ascendancy of
Stalinism and ensure maximal social participation, thereby securing
state legitimacy. Yet whatever habitus it was, paradoxically it had to be
performed correctly and singularly; and herein lay the key to Stalinism's
extraordinary and horrific control over social action.
In this way we might be able to understand the denunciations of
colleagues, neighbours and family members; the fervent expression of
socialist piety in the light of brutal interrogation; the 'confessions' to
'crimes', all the while asserting one's devotion to Stalin and the socialist
enterprise (even when it became clear to the bewildered and confused
victims of this process that they had failed to perform socialism properly
despite their earnest personal belief that they were being successful).
Ironically, the totalitarian nature of the Stalinist state was not realised
by recourse to what would appear to be a totalising discourse. Rather,
absolute authority was achieved by harnessing an urge towards such a
totalising discourse. This was coupled with the arbitrary actions of the
state as personified by Stalin and state agents who determined erratically
and wilfully what appeared to be an appropriate expression of that
urge as local contingencies required.
The performance of socialism permeated every aspect of political
and daily life: ideology, work, speech, family relations, dress and the
domestic interior. What might have appeared as a retreat in favour of
popular aspirations (Fitzpatrick), or a co-optive 'big deal' (Dunham),
was in its technical effect more like an extraordinarily elaborate means
of keeping the terms of socialist performance uncertain ('fuzzy'). This
ensured popular participation until the state and its agents chose when
to exercise arbitrary certainty in these matters, and exert crushing power
over individuals with the bloodiest of consequences. The 'axiological
urge' and its yearning for consensus was subtly and cynically exploited
under Stalinism with devastating consequences.
The state retreated in its attempts to rationalise the domestic sphere
and the feminine and instead focused its rationalising efforts upon
social 'hygiene' in public roles and the masculine. However, the
constitution of the domestic realm could be invoked at will by virtue
of contextual understandings of material culture used to describe an
'alien class element' as 'anti-Soviet', thereby implicating every aspect
of an individual's domestic life by association. Two identical domestic
strategies of socialist performance could he considered at once 'alien'
and 'Soviet', depending upon whether the agent was a designated class
enemy or loyal Party member. In essence, everything was determined
by the socially and variably constituted role of the agent, which in
turn determined the context by which domestic strategies would be
evaluated.
As noted earlier, the sphere of socialist performance shifted from the
domestic realm, where it had been during the Cultural Revolution.
The new sphere of performance focused instead on the physical bodies
of Soviet citizens in the public realm; on those constituted as 'kulaks',
'Trotskyites', 'class aliens' and 'wreckers'. The language of hygiene used
to eradicate petit-bourgeois consciousness (as embodied by 'dirt' and
'vermin' in relation to furniture, design and domestic life) shifted with
devastating results onto human beings themselves. In this respect, the
case of individuals and their families during the Purges was of particular
significance. The demiurgic process of socialist construction shifted
from material culture to human 'material'. It rooted out 'alien' elements
and attempted literally to create an entirely new human stock for the
realisation of socialism.
"