Editing Stalinism (section)

=== Cult of personality ===
{{Main|Joseph Stalin's cult of personality|The Fall of Berlin (film)|The Unforgettable Year 1919| The Battle of Stalingrad (film)|The Third Blow}}
[[File:Poster of Azerbaijan 1938. Constitutions.jpg|right|thumb|150px|[[Soviet Azerbaijan]] poster featuring an enlarged Stalin with workers]]

In the aftermath of the succession struggle, in which Stalin had defeated both [[Left Opposition|Left]] and [[Right Opposition]], a cult of Stalin had materialised.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Fitzpatrick |first1=Sheila |title=The Shortest History of the Soviet Union |date=6 February 2023 |publisher=Pan Macmillan |isbn=978-93-90742-78-3 |page=116 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2KynEAAAQBAJ&q=Sheila+Fitzpatrick.+A+Brief+History+of+the+Soviet+Union+%3D+Sheila+Fitzpatrick.+The+Shortest+History+of+the+Soviet+Union. |language=en}}</ref> From 1929 until 1953, there was a proliferation of [[architecture]], [[statues]], [[posters]], [[banners]] and [[iconography]] featuring Stalin in which he was increasingly identified with the state and seen as an emblem of Marxism.<ref name="Introduction">{{cite journal |last1=Pisch |first1=Anita |title=Introduction |journal=The Personality Cult of Stalin in Soviet Posters, 1929–1953 |date=2016 |pages=1–48 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1q1crzp.6 |publisher=ANU Press|jstor=j.ctt1q1crzp.6 |isbn=978-1-76046-062-4 }}</ref> In July 1930, a state decree instructed 200 artists to prepare propaganda posters for the Five Year Plans and collectivsation measures.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Pisch |first1=Anita |title=The personality cult of Stalin in Soviet posters, 1929–1953 |date=2016 |publisher=ANU Press |isbn=978-1-76046-062-4 |pages=87–190 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1q1crzp.8 |chapter=The rise of the Stalin personality cult|jstor=j.ctt1q1crzp.8 }}</ref> Historian Anita Pisch drew specific focus to the various manifestations of the personality cult in which Stalin was associated with the "Father", "Saviour" and "Warrior" cultural archetypes with the latter imagery having gained ascendency during the [[Soviet Union in World War II|Great Patrotic War]] and [[Cold War]].<ref name="Introduction" />

[[File:PomnikStalina-Praga1.jpg|thumb|left|150px|[[Stalin Monument (Prague)|Stalin's monument]] in Prague]]

Some scholars have argued that Stalin took an active involvement with the construction of the cult of personality<ref>{{cite book |last1=Saxonberg |first1=Steven |title=Transitions and Non-Transitions from Communism: Regime Survival in China, Cuba, North Korea, and Vietnam |date=14 February 2013 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-107-02388-8 |page=111 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zQw-RWxrPSUC&dq=stalin+built+a+cult+around+himself&pg=PA111 |language=en}}</ref> with writers such as [[Isaac Deutscher]] and Erik van Ree noting that Stalin had absorbed elements from the cult of Tsars, Orthodox Christianity and highlighting specific acts such as [[Death and state funeral of Vladimir Lenin|Lenin's embalming]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Ree |first1=Erik van |title=The Political Thought of Joseph Stalin: A Study in Twentieth Century Revolutionary Patriotism |date=27 August 2003 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-135-78604-5 |pages=1–384 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tLZy9dhBsPgC&dq=stalin+lenin+embalmed+cult+of+personality&pg=PT191 |language=en}}</ref> Yet, other scholars have drawn on primary accounts from Stalin's associates such as [[Vyacheslav Molotov|Molotov]] which suggested he took a more critical and ambivalent attitude towards his cult of personality.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Davies |first1=Sarah |last2=Harris |first2=James |title=Stalin's World: Dictating the Soviet Order |date=14 October 2014 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-18281-1 |page=134 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TQiSBAAAQBAJ&dq=stalin+cult+of+personality+molotov&pg=PA134 |language=en}}</ref>

The cult of personality served to legitimate Stalin's authority, and establish continuity with Lenin as his "discipline, student and mentee" in the view of his wider followers.<ref name="Introduction" /><ref>{{cite book |last1=Stone |first1=Dan |title=The Oxford Handbook of Postwar European History |date=17 May 2012 |publisher=OUP Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-956098-1 |page=465 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PHD3TsVlqKAC&dq=stalin+cult+of+personality+legitimise&pg=PA465 |language=en}}</ref> His successor, [[Nikita Khrushchev]], would later denounce the cult of personality around Stalin as contradictory to Leninist principles and party discourse.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Claeys |first1=Gregory |title=Encyclopedia of Modern Political Thought (set) |date=20 August 2013 |publisher=CQ Press |isbn=978-1-5063-0836-4 |page=162 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1qjlCAAAQBAJ&dq=stalin+cult+of+personality+legitimise&pg=PA162 |language=en}}</ref>