Dictatorship, State Planning, and Social Theory in the German Democratic Republic

ISBN-13: 9780521820905 / Angielski / Twarda / 2003 / 232 str.

Houston) Peter C. Caldwell (Rice University

Opis

This book examines how communist East Germany functioned according to the views of its leading experts in law, economics, philosophy, and cybernetics. The state-socialist countries aimed for post-capitalist modernization, which they hoped to achieve through dictatorship. The lessons of this failed combination of dictatorship and social transformation remain relevant today. Going beyond the research of many works on the social theory of modernization, this book reveals how East German theorists prevailed under Stalinism.

Recenzje

'… Peter C. Caldwell's present work superbly details how the GDR's own economists and intellectuals had clearly foreseen, already in the 1950s, the quagmire, and tyranny, that an 'economically planned' and 'consciously directed' society would lead to. In an engaging and thoroughly readable monograph, Caldwell examines the economy, law, and social philosophy in the GDR from 1949 to 1968 … Caldwell's project is ambitious, broad, and largely successful.' Totalitarismus und Demokratie

Spis treści

List of illustrations; Preface; Acknowledgements; Introduction: modernization, modernity and the plan; 1. The economics of state socialism: productivity and the law of value; 2. The legal theory of state socialism: socialist legality, the laws of historical development and the plan; 3. Philosophy and state socialism: consciousness, dialectical materialism and hope; 4. From planning metaphysics to cybernetics: planning, technique and politics after revisionism; Conclusion; Bibliography; Index.