Editing Eastern Bloc (section)

==Social structure==
Eastern Bloc societies operated under anti-meritocratic principles with strong egalitarian elements. For example, Czechoslovakia favoured less qualified individuals, as well as providing privileges for the [[nomenklatura]] and those with the right class or political background. Eastern Bloc societies were dominated by the ruling communist party, dubbed "partyocracy" by Pavel Machonin.<ref name="Machonin, P (1993)">{{cite journal |last1=Machonin |first1=Pavel |title=The Social Structure of Soviet-Type Societies, Its Collapse and Legacy |journal=Czech Sociological Review |date=1993 |volume=1 |issue=2 |pages=234–235 |jstor=43945192 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/43945192 |access-date=17 May 2024}}</ref> Former members of the middle-class were officially discriminated against, though the need for their skills allowed them to re-invent themselves as good communist citizens.<ref name="James, M (2005)">{{cite journal |last1=Mark |first1=James |title=Discrimination, opportunity, and middle-class success in early Communist Hungary |journal=The Historical Journal |date=June 2005 |volume=48 |issue=2 |pages=499–521 |doi=10.1017/S0018246X05004486 |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/33CC6D7338635CA31C36D84DE015E1AD/S0018246X05004486a.pdf/div-class-title-discrimination-opportunity-and-middle-class-success-in-early-communist-hungary-div.pdf |archive-date=27 April 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190427095703id_/https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/33CC6D7338635CA31C36D84DE015E1AD/S0018246X05004486a.pdf/div-class-title-discrimination-opportunity-and-middle-class-success-in-early-communist-hungary-div.pdf}}</ref><ref name="Tchouikina, S (2009)">{{cite book |last1=Tchouikina |first1=Sofia |editor1-last=Packard |editor1-first=Noel |title=Sociology of Memory: Papers from the Spectrum |date=2009 |publisher=Cambridge Scholars Publishing |location=Newcastle upon Tyne |isbn=978-1-4438-0199-7 |pages=63–99 |url=https://shs.hal.science/halshs-01904567 |access-date=17 May 2024 |language=en |chapter=Collective Memory and Reconversion of Elite: Former Nobles in Soviet Society after 1917}}</ref>