Kagarlitsky is a young Russian sociologist of "new left" persuasion, deeply involved in the movement for a more open future for the cultural and political life of his country but still unable to publish his work there. This book, written in 1982 and circulated in samizdat, is notable for the full picture it gives of the fate, role and influence of the intelligentsia, and of individual writers, in relation to changing political conditions, and also for the extensive use made of Western writings generally unknown or ignored in the U.S.S.R.