The Mythologies of Capitalism and the End of the Soviet Project

By (author) Olga Baysha

Publication date:

14 August 2014

Length of book:

184 pages

Publisher

Lexington Books

ISBN-13: 9780739188026

The purpose of The Mythologies of Capitalism and the End of the Soviet Project is to show that in order to understand popular disillusionment with democratization, liberalization, and other transformations associated with the attempts of non-Western societies to appropriate the ideas of Western modernity, one must consider how these ideas are mythologized in the course of such appropriations. Olga Baysha argues that the seeds of popular post-revolutionary frustration should be sought in pre-revolutionary discourses on democracy, liberalism, and other concepts of Western modernity that are produced outside local contexts and introduced through the channels of global communication and the interpretations of politicians, activists, and experts. Analyzing the opinions of working people and intellectuals published in two Ukrainian newspapers of perestroika times, the author shows how the concepts of democracy, the market, and the West acquired schizophrenic mythical significations. The study is situated within the context of Ulrich Beck’s theory of world risk society and Gregory Bateson’s theory of schizophrenia as communicative disorder. The author argues that schizophrenic mythologies constructed through globalized networks can lead to disorientation, frustration, and the sense of uncertainty and insecurity on the part of mass publics.

CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
PART I. MODERNITY AND MYTH
CHAPTER 1. Modernity and Its Projects
Modernity, Colonization, and Globalization
Multiple Modernities and Cultural Hybridization
Modernization through Internal Colonization
The Myth of Enlightenment
CHAPTER 2. Deconstructing Mythologies
Roland Barthes’s Mythologies
The Schizophrenia of the Network
The Idea of Framing
Frame Analysis of Modernization Myths
PART II. SOVIET MODERNITY
CHAPTER 3. The Rise and Fall of an Alternative Project
Great Transformation
Stagnation and Gorbachev Reforms
CHAPTER 4. The Discourses of Perestroika
Democracy
Market
The United States
PART III. THE VERNACULAR VS. THE ELITE
On Methodology
CHAPTER 5. Mythologizing Democracy
Intellectual Mythology: The Highway of Civilization
Vernacular Mythology: Power to the People!
CHAPTER 6. Mythologizing the Market
Intellectual Mythology: The invisible Hand
Vernacular Mythology: Enriching Working People
CHAPTER 7. Mythologizing the United States: The Horn of Plenty
PART IV. THE SCHIZOPHRENIA OF PERESTROIKA
CHAPTER 8. The Twilight Zone
The Spirit of Hopelessness
World Risk Society
The Logic of Both / And
CHAPTER 9. Schizophrenia as a Communicative Disorder
Double Bind
Network Schizophrenia and the Public Sphere
CHAPTER 10. Personal Reflections
CONCLUSION
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Sources: Media Articles
Secondary Sources
APPENDIX A. Research Design
Data Collecting
Coding
APPENDIX B. Statistical Results

Baysha's point is not simply that 'the intellectuals' were deluded or cynical tools and that Soviet citizens were misled and taken advantage of. . . .more important is her argument that what took place here was a form of collective communicative disorientation.