| Author/Contributor(s): | Sartre, Jean-Paul |
| Publisher: | Verso |
| Date: | 8/3/2027 |
| Binding: | Paperback |
| Condition: | NEW |
In the wake of Stalin's death and Khrushchev's "Secret Speech", Jean-Paul Sartre reflects on what the legacy of Stalinism means for the international socialist movement. The exposure of mass repression, purges, and terror forces the left to confront a painful truth: a system claiming to act in the name of emancipation produced systematic domination.
Beginning with an exploration of how a movement centred on freedom produced mass repression, purges and bureaucratic domination, Sartre frames Stalinism as a failure of praxis. At the same time, he maintains that anti-communism is not an adequate response to authoritarianism. Sartre challenges both blind loyalty and easy condemnation, insisting that socialism must reckon honestly with its past while defending the ideal of emancipation. Focussed on the tension between freedom and authority, this timeless reflection centres on the necessity of collective action and mass participation in the socialist project. Still as poignant as it was upon its publication in 1957, The Ghost of Stalin insists that once the left confronts its legacy head-on, emancipation is possible.