In 1956 Nikita Khrushchev denounces Stalin's crimes to a closed session of the Twentieth Party Congress in February, and in October and November the Hungarian uprising is crushed by Soviet armor. The double shock breaks the Western parties, empties their memberships, and opens the era in which Marxism's claim to embody emancipation is contested first of all in its own house.
Tagged: Marxism
The Event
- Date
- 1956 (exact)
- Era
- Crisis and After; Standard periodization of Marxist history
- Location
- Moscow; today Moscow, Russia
- Traditions
- Marxism
- Streams
- Marxism
- Key figures
- Nikita Khrushchev, Imre Nagy
Primary Sources
- Khrushchev, Nikita. On the Cult of Personality and Its Consequences. Closed session of the Twentieth Congress, 25 February 1956.
Secondary Sources
- Anderson, Perry. Considerations on Western Marxism. London: New Left Books, 1976.
- Kolakowski, Leszek. Main Currents of Marxism. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978.
- McLellan, David. Karl Marx: A Biography. London: Palgrave Macmillan, fourth edition, 2006.
Provenance: HIST-1464; confidence 0.95; accessed 2026-10-30.
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World View
Marxism
Marxism explains history as the struggle of classes over material production, and aims at a classless society in which exploitation and alienation are ended.