Импортная вещь и дух консюмеризма: потребительские аспекты выездного туризма в СССР

Soviet and Post Soviet Review. 2016. № 43 (2). С. 182–218.

Orlov I. B., Попов А. Д.

The article tourist travel of Soviet citizens abroad are considered not only as an instrument of ideological and cultural offensive of the socialist system, the way of learning or of receiving pleasure as an important channel of purchasing imported items, and rare for the Soviet people the opportunity to meet with the Western culture of consumption. This allows to reveal the specificity and inner logic of the phenomenon of Soviet consumer culture inherent in her cult imported items are formed contrary to the official dogma of discourse that "Soviet – means better". On the basis of archival documents, materials of the Soviet press and the memoirs of former tourists are shown how the cult of imported goods formed a special, two-level model of the behavior of the Soviet people abroad. If outwardly, they tried to match the Canon "ideological person," but at the same time, almost all citizens of the USSR more or less openly manifest traits of "economic man" seeking by all means to buy as many imported items and financial "justify" an expensive trip. As the growth of outbound tourism in the USSR and the deformation of the system of selection of candidates for departure (lowering strap travel requirements, bureaucratic formalism, the spread of corrupt practices) the ideological component became more openly ignored, and the consumer, the mission has come to the fore. The skills of "economic man", acquired by the Soviet citizens during trips abroad, proved to be very popular in the new socio-economic conditions.

Keywords: выездной туризм, консюмеризм, культура потребления, импортная вещь, человек экономический