Chapter 9 Vocabulary (Textbook)

Question 1

base

Answer 1

The economic system of a society, made up of technology (the means of production) and class relations between people (the relations of production)

Question 2

bourgeoisie

Answer 2

The property-owning class

Question 3

Central Committee

Answer 3

The legislature-like body of a communist party

Question 4

central planning

Answer 4

A communist economic system in which thate state explicitly allocates resources by planning what should be produced in what amounts, the final prices of goods, and where they should be sold

Question 4

glasnost

Answer 4

Literally, “openness”; the policy of political liberalization implemented in the Soviet Union in the late 1980s

Question 4

dialectical materialism

Answer 4

Process of historical change that is not evolutionary but revolutionary; the existing base and superstructure (thesis) would come into conflict with new technological innovations, generating growing opposition to the existing order (antithesis)–this would culminate in revolution, overthrowing the old base and superstructure (synthesis)

Question 5

nomenklatura

Answer 5

Politically sensitive or influential jobs in the state, society, or economy that were staffed by people chosen or approved by the Communist Party

Question 6

party-state

Answer 6

A political system in which power flows directly from the ruling political party (usually a communist party) to the state, bypassing government structures

Question 7

perestroika

Answer 7

Literally, “restructuring”; the policy of political and economic liberalization implemented in the Soviet Union in the late 1980s

Question 8

Politburo

Answer 8

Top policy-making and executive body of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s

Question 9

shock therapy

Answer 9

A process of rapid modernization

Question 9

proletariat

Answer 9

The working class

Question 10

superstructure

Answer 10

All noneconomic institutions in a society (for example, religion, culture, national identity); these ideas and values derive from the base and serve to legitimize the current system of exploitation

Question 11

vanguard of the proletariat

Answer 11

Lenin’s argument that an elite communist party would have to carry out revolution, because as a result of false consciousness, historical conditions would not automatically lead to capitalism’s decline