Talk:Nomenklatura

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Old talk[edit]

This article uses the "communal apartment" expression. I think this means an apartment shared by several families, rather than an apartment owned by the state. Maybe this should be transformed into a link, but to what?

A communal apartment ("komunal'ka") is a room with a shared kitchen and bath. Pre-Revolutionary buildings were subdivided into apartments, often with five or more rooms per unit. The building is owned by the government so it's essentially public housing, but it's possible to privatize your apartment (the room) by paying a large amount of money to the government. Sluggoster (talk) 09:08, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There are surely signs of this evolving in Britain under New Labour? No wonder former members of teh Communist Party are thriving in Government!

History of post-Soviet Russia article gives a very different (although not contradictory) reason as to why the Oligarchs have been such important figures after the fall of communism, namely the The "loans for shares" scheme.

Not very different at all. Mikkalai 16:56, 15 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, this article is incorrect. One description is given here: Nomenclatura used the komsomol leaders to get the property. Some of these leaders became oligarchs (but many were nobodies before 1990). The old nomenclatura retained positions in the new government, eventually getting some of the property. But when we are talking about Russian oligarchs, they weren't members of nomenclatura. Paranoid 20:01, 15 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I will not engage in editing of this article, since I give a damn for modern Russia, but please let me say that you are incredibly naive. In Russia of the Latter Day Soviets the only people that had access to real money were nomenklatura and thieves. Period. Mikkalai 04:28, 16 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Eh? Where does does that contradict what I wrote? I am just saying that oligarchs were not members of nomenklatura. That's very easy to check. Most of them were nobody and during early 90s became thieves and then oligarchs. Paranoid 12:20, 16 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Well, from what I've read it seems apparent that a huge number (a majority?) of them were among the lower classes of the authorities, that is for instance secretaries of city/rayon committees, chiefs of factories and so on. Halibu tt 15:13, May 16, 2005 (UTC)

Needs general fixing, NPOV work, more facts, etc.172.193.255.206 14:37, 25 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Objections to having a ruling class[edit]

Marx said (and later Communists agreed) that it's bad to have a ruling class. This was the justification for the socialist revolution.

Critics say that the Communists merely replaced the corrupt ruling class of the Tzar and aristocracy with a new ruling class - the nomenklatura - which became the new aristocracy (the new elite).

In the days of the Soviet Union, for example, this elite was called the nomenclatura, and if you were lucky enough to be a member life was good. You lived in a restricted neighborhood or housing complex whose inhabitants were also members of the nomenclatura, your health care was provided at private hospitals staffed by highly-trained physicians and equipped with the world’s most advanced medical technologies, your children were enrolled in private schools, your family vacationed at resorts open only to nomenclatura families, and your wives had access to stores barred to members of the to the general public and stocked with all sorts of goodies from beef, to caviar, to fancy faucets for the bathroom sink to household items such as babies’ disposable diapers not available in local shops. [1]

What's the best way to add criticism like this to the article? Uncle Ed 18:46, 27 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

One way may be to examine where the Nomenklatura is still operational, i.e. Cuba, PRC, & North Korea. nobs 18:52, 27 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Americans recently saw how the Nomenklatura operates up close and personal, with the Elian Gonzalez debate; Elain's father recieved larger rations of beans and rice because of his connection to the Cuban Nomenclatura, yet the word was never used in English articles reporting the story. nobs 19:45, 27 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Why not "Nomenclature"?[edit]

Why not? Xx236 11:06, 16 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There alreadyexists a page of that name.--Nema Fakei 20:04, 31 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Source of the term "Nomenklatura"[edit]

Some vandal evidently had a problem with the derivation of the word "nomenklatura", adding "Do you really believe this!?!?!??!". I deleted this, but added a citation needed tag. While I don't have a source yet, I remember reading that this is an accurate derivation of the word.

NPOV Tag[edit]

Added the NPOV tag as the article appears largely negative, and contains a significant number of loaded words (i.e. clearly does not conform with WP:NPOV). From what I remember about nomenklatura, it had both advantages and drawbawbacks; and despite indeed having a number of corrupt individuals, it presents a rather interesting way of organizing a government. If I have time, I'll try to correct the article myself, but unfortunately that's not likely to happen in the next few months, so I'd strongly encourage someone else to do it. ikh (talk) 22:27, 14 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Nomenklatura is a pejorative, tongue-in-cheek term, and is used as such in negative contexts, serving (in part) as a substitute for "oligarchy" in former communist countries when referring to their ruling classes. All the article does is reflect this. I suggest we remove the tag. Thoughts? Reichenbach 13:59, 27 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Removal of content[edit]

Why was this removed @ [2]

"Supporters of state socialism, however, claim that Djilas's view is not supported by the facts, maintaining: The privileges that workers of nomenklatura had were at least an order of magnitude lower than those afforded to CEOs and business-owners in countries such as United States. For example, Stalin's wife wrote him once about going to the exam by tram. She had to take a taxi only because the tram broke (September 2, 1929). In another example Stalin's parents-in-law lived in a communal apartment. Of course, after the war the ascetic lifestyle was not maintained, but this happened with the similar improvement in quality of life of average Soviet people. Many members of nomenklatura also explained later that the privileges weren't something provided by the system, instead it was the possibility of corruption that those less honest used."

-- It should rightly have been tagged "citation needed"...? That'd be me. Skrewz 11:11, 25 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Uncited content can be removed anytime.Ultramarine 01:45, 26 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Deletion seconded. `'mikkanarxi 18:42, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

LOC text[edit]

A good pick!

However the LOC text is quite chaotic and essayish, and requires restructuring. In particular, it must be stated clearly that "nomenclatura" was not purely for positions inside the Party. This article is a good place to explain how Party excerted control over all aspects of the whole country, not only party itself, using the mechanism of "nomenklatura". `'mikkanarxi 18:38, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The same source has several articles on related topics. See chapter 7. Maybe something could be added? Ultramarine 12:38, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Trotskyism[edit]

The reason why the trotskyists prefered caste before class in describing the nomenklatura is not a question of terminology. It is a result of their, i my eyes flawed, analysis of the soviet union. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.172.144.196 (talk) 16:03, 26 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Privileges[edit]

The article is overly abstract. It could be fleshed out with a discussion of the privileges awarded to Nomenklatura, such as shopping in special stores that stocked scarce commodities and some Western goods, and vacationing in restricted areas, such as the Curonian Spit.

Sca (talk) 16:58, 20 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would also like to see more information on numbers, if available: How many members of the nomenklatura at the various levels. MikeR613 (talk) 15:42, 25 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Israel Flag in preview of link of this page?[edit]

I'm not sure why, since no reference to Jews or Israel appears within the article itself, but when someone hovers over the link to this page from another article (in my case it was on the article "Predictions of the collapse of the Soviet Union") the article preview text is accompanied by a large Israeli flag. Given the topic of the article and the prevalence of antisemitic conspiracy theories that accuse Jews of secretly running government, should this perhaps be changed? I would change if I knew how. 2600:8803:5E00:1D0:F56F:7A73:F7D0:7C2 (talk) 02:07, 19 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I guess Mossad is secretly but sloppily running your computer :-) I see no image in preview. Preview of trotsky link nearby shows portrait of trotsky, preview of Stalin link shows stalin. The preview shows the top image in the page. Are you using desktop or mobile device? Do your friends see the same? - Altenmann >talk 03:08, 19 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

This is the result of template vandalism. It was quickly reverted but the effect remained in the cache for some articles. It must be mostly gone by now. Nardog (talk) 07:53, 19 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Pipes on nomenklatura[edit]

"nomenklatura system mainly reflected a continuation of the old Tsarist regime, as many former Tsarist officials or "careerists" joined the Bolshevik government during and after the Russian Civil War"

I find this thoroughly dubious, both by fact and possibility, bearing in mind the idea of dictatorship of proletariat. Maybe a wikipedia misrepresented Pipes? Can someone double-check in the book?- Altenmann >talk 03:15, 19 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]