Stalinismus a destalinizace (Bulharsko, Rumunsko a Albánie v padesátých letech)

In the latter half of the 1940s, processes generally known as 'Sovietization' took place in Bulgaria, Rumania and Albania. This meant a total submission of these countries to Moscow. The ruling Communists in the countries of so-called 'people's democracy' were not allowed any more to develop any model of organization and control of society differing from the Soviet one. The Cold War required total obedience in the Soviet block that was not supposed to be weakened by heresy any more (as in J. B. Tito's case). Stalin's death in March 1953, however, and the following search for a 'new course', accompanied by destalinization, caused another slow erosion of the Soviet Empire. The first country to get partly rid of its dependence was Rumania, for the sake of a sort of 'liberalism', followed by Albania, for the sake of dogmatism. Only Bulgaria, where Todor Zhivkov's regime became established for several decades, remained an absolutely loyal and never arguing ally of the Soviet Union in Southeast Europe.