About this scholarly article

SIX · Toward Cultural Revolution by Decree: The Pattern of Administrative Assault by Gregory J. Massell is a scholarly article available to read on EtoBox.

The attempted modernization of Central Asia by the central Soviet government in the 1920's was a dramatic confrontation between radical, determined, authoritarian communists and a cluster of traditional Moslem societies based on kinship, custom, and religion. The Soviet authorities were determined to undermine the traditional social order through the destruction of existing family structures and worked to achieve this aspect of revolution through the mobilization of women. Gregory J. Massell's study of the interaction between central power and local traditions concentrates on the development of female roles in revolutionary modernization. Women in Moslem societies were segregated, exploited, and degraded; they were, therefore, a structural weak point in the traditional order—a surrogate proletariat. Through this potentially subversive group, it was believed, intense conflicts could be generated within society which would lead to its disintegration and subsequent reconstitution. The first part of the book isolates the trends that made Central Asia vulnerable to outside intervention, and examines the factors that impelled the communist elites to turn to Moslem women as potential revo

Author

Gregory J. Massell

Publisher

Princeton University Press

Published

1974

Language

EN

ISBN

9780691645483