Yugoslav Bureaucracy Cynicism
anecdote · personal/autobiographical ·
retold in 6 talks
In Yugoslavia, the ruling communist bureaucracy knew the official ideology was false; honest communists who took it seriously lost their posts because taking it seriously was a step toward dissidence.
≤2000talks it is told in, per year2026
As told 6
“the ruling bureaucracy knew well that if you take the official ideology, seriously, is one step from dissidence.”
“if you were member of the Communist Party and took the official ideology seriously you were in danger. Because you were suspected of being potentially a dissident.”
“Taking the official ideology seriously is a first step towards dissidence. It's an ideology which worked on condition that it was not taken seriously.”
What it carries
one story, many jobs: the ideas this anecdote is deployed to argue, one tally mark per use (an idea page shows the same relation from the other end, as its shelf of stories)
Its cast and sources
populated by
Göran Therborn2Lina Wertmüller2Jela Krečič1Herbert Marshall1Ivan Hvala1Jamal Khashoggi1Kwasi Kwarteng1Valentim1
alongside works
Every retelling 6
In Yugoslavia, the ruling communist bureaucracy knew the official ideology was false; honest communists who took it seriously lost their posts because taking it seriously was a step toward dissidence., illustrating cynical distance,ideology
Personal: in a low-level Central Committee post in Yugoslav self-management socialism, taking the official ideology seriously marked you as a potential dissident; belonging required private distance from the system., illustrating ideology,interpellation
In late Yugoslav communism, not believing the official ideology was fine, but if you took it seriously, authorities considered you dangerous because taking the ideology seriously led to noticing the gap between it and reality., illustrating ideology works without belief,cynicism,Yugoslav socialism
Two early-1970s friends lost their Central Committee jobs for genuinely believing in self-management socialism, sincere belief in the ruling ideology was itself treated as the first step toward dissidence., illustrating cynical ideology
Two friends who worked in the Central Committee in the 1970s lost their jobs, not for dissidence but for sincerely believing in the official self-management ideology. The nomenklatura treated true belief as more threatening than cynicism., illustrating cynicism as ideological necessity,late socialism,ideology
In early 1970s Yugoslavia, two of Žižek's friends lost their jobs at the Central Committee because they genuinely believed in self-management socialism, taking the ruling ideology seriously was itself treated as the first step toward dissidence., illustrating ideological cynicism,cynical distance as ideology,comedy and cynicism under socialism