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An apparatchik (; russian:
аппара́тчик ) was a full-time, professional
functionary
An official is someone who holds an office (function or mandate, regardless whether it carries an actual working space with it) in an organization or government and participates in the exercise of authority, (either their own or that of their ...
of the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
"Hymn of the Bolshevik Party"
, headquarters = 4 Staraya Square, Moscow
, general_secretary = Vladimir Lenin (first) Mikhail Gorbachev (last)
, founded =
, banned =
, founder = Vladimir Lenin
, newspaper ...
or the
Soviet government
The Government of the Soviet Union ( rus, Прави́тельство СССР, p=prɐˈvʲitʲɪlʲstvə ɛs ɛs ɛs ˈɛr, r=Pravítelstvo SSSR, lang=no), formally the All-Union Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, commonly ab ...
''apparat'' (
аппарат, apparatus), someone who held any position of
bureaucratic
The term bureaucracy () refers to a body of non-elected governing officials as well as to an administrative policy-making group. Historically, a bureaucracy was a government administration managed by departments staffed with non-elected offi ...
or
political
Politics (from , ) is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studies ...
responsibility, with the exception of the higher ranks of management called
nomenklatura
The ''nomenklatura'' ( rus, номенклату́ра, p=nəmʲɪnklɐˈturə, a=ru-номенклатура.ogg; from la, nomenclatura) were a category of people within the Soviet Union and other Eastern Bloc countries who held various key admi ...
.
James Billington describes an apparatchik as "a man not of grand plans, but of a hundred carefully executed details." The term is often considered derogatory, with negative
connotation
A connotation is a commonly understood cultural or emotional association that any given word or phrase carries, in addition to its explicit or literal meaning, which is its denotation.
A connotation is frequently described as either positive o ...
s in terms of the quality, competence, and attitude of a person thus described.
Members of the apparat (apparatchiks or apparatchiki) were frequently transferred between different areas of responsibility, usually with little or no actual training for their new areas of responsibility. Thus, the term apparatchik, or "agent of the apparatus" was usually the best possible description of the person's profession and occupation. Not all apparatchiks held lifelong positions. Many only entered such positions in middle age. They were known to receive various benefits including free holiday vouchers, free meals and accommodation. Today ''apparatchik'' is also used in contexts other than that of the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
or communist countries. According to
Collins English Dictionary
The ''Collins English Dictionary'' is a printed and online dictionary of English. It is published by HarperCollins in Glasgow.
The edition of the dictionary in 1979 with Patrick Hanks as editor and Laurence Urdang as editorial director, was ...
the word can mean "an official or bureaucrat in any organization". According to Douglas Harper's ''
Online Etymology Dictionary'', the term was also used in the meaning "Communist agent or spy", originating in the writings of
Arthur Koestler
Arthur Koestler, (, ; ; hu, Kösztler Artúr; 5 September 1905 – 1 March 1983) was a Hungarian-born author and journalist. Koestler was born in Budapest and, apart from his early school years, was educated in Austria. In 1931, Koestler join ...
, c. 1941.
See also
*
Bureaucracy
The term bureaucracy () refers to a body of non-elected governing officials as well as to an administrative policy-making group. Historically, a bureaucracy was a government administration managed by departments staffed with non-elected offi ...
*
Cadre (politics)
In political contexts a cadre (, , ) consists of a person recognized as a capable militant within a political organization. In some socialist governments, a cadre is a group of people trained to carry out the goals of the Party-State and dissem ...
*
Clientelism
Clientelism or client politics is the exchange of goods and services for political support, often involving an implicit or explicit quid-pro-quo. It is closely related to patronage politics and vote buying. Clientelism involves an asymmetric rel ...
*
Jobsworth
A jobsworth is a person who uses the (typically small) authority of their job in a deliberately uncooperative way, or who seemingly delights in acting in an obstructive or unhelpful manner. It characterizes one who upholds petty rules even at the ...
*
New class
New class is used as a polemic term by critics of countries that followed the Soviet-type Communism to describe the privileged ruling class of bureaucrats and Communist party functionaries which arose in these states. Generally, the group known ...
*
Nomenklatura
The ''nomenklatura'' ( rus, номенклату́ра, p=nəmʲɪnklɐˈturə, a=ru-номенклатура.ogg; from la, nomenclatura) were a category of people within the Soviet Union and other Eastern Bloc countries who held various key admi ...
*
Partmaximum Partmaximum (russian: Партмаксимум) was a limit on the salary of a member of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union, a maximum wage. Partmaximum was introduced in 1920 by a decree of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee (ВЦИ ...
*
Political commissar
References
Further reading
*
External links
*{{cite web , url=http://bobshea.net/empire_of_the_rising_scum.html , title=Empire of the Rising Scum , first=Robert , last=Shea , author-link=Robert Shea , date=1990 , website=BobShea.net
*
Management occupations
Russian words and phrases
Soviet phraseology