Chief editor of the 5-volume Philosophical Encyclopedia and architect of the standard Soviet Marxist-Leninist philosophy textbook
"Is he writing about them — or about us?!" — his handwritten comment on Yu. A. Levada's entry on 'fascism' for the Philosophical Encyclopedia
Ideological official who guarded Soviet philosophical orthodoxy during the Thaw. As chief editor of the 5-volume Philosophical Encyclopedia he set the boundaries of Marxism-Leninism; remembered by colleagues as an unwavering Stalinist.
Career Timeline
- 1901Born in Novosyolki, Nizhny Novgorod Governorate, to a peasant family
- 1917–1920Fought in the October Revolution and Siberian Civil War; joined RKP(b) in 1918
- 1932Graduated philosophy division, Institute of Red Professors; senior researcher at Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute (1932–1933)
- 1933–1941Academic secretary, Institute of Philosophy, Communist Academy (1933–1935); editor-in-chief of Book and Proletarian Revolution and department head at Pravda (1935–1941); professor and doctor of sciences (1935)
- 1941–1945Lecturer, CC Propaganda and Agitation Directorate (1941–1942); volunteered for the Red Army, trophy department chief of 84th Rifle Corps, lieutenant colonel, two Orders of the Red Star
- 1945–1954Senior researcher, deputy director and party committee secretary at the Institute of Philosophy (1945–1951); editor-in-chief of Voprosy Filosofii (1952–1954); chair of philosophy at Moscow State University (1953–1954); rector of Academy of Social Sciences (1954–1955)
- 1955–1958Head of CC Propaganda and Agitation Department (for union republics from 1956); candidate CC member (1956–1961)
- 1958–1967Editor-in-chief of Kommunist (1958–1962); director of the Institute of Philosophy (1962–1967); full academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1964)
- 1960–1970Chief editor of the 5-volume Philosophical Encyclopedia — curated the official knowledge compendium of Soviet philosophy
- 1967–1991Academician-secretary of the Department of Philosophy and Law (1967–1975); founding president of the Philosophical Society of the USSR (1971–1987); deputy chair of Znanie society (1968–1987); died of natural causes, buried at Troyekurovskoye Cemetery
Related historical events
Ideological Gatekeeper of the Thaw — From Agitprop Chief to the Philosophical Encyclopedia
Konstantinov's appointment as head of the CC Agitprop Department in 1955 came at a moment of upheaval for the Soviet ideological apparatus. After Khrushchev's de-Stalinization speech at the 20th Party Congress the following year, Konstantinov walked the narrow path between 'anti-revisionism' and 'anti-dogmatism,' serving as the operational manager who set the boundaries of official Marxism-Leninism. In the wake of the 1956 Hungarian uprising he publicly warned of the 'revisionist' danger spreading among intellectuals. Even after leaving Agitprop, as editor-in-chief of Kommunist (1958–1962) and director of the Institute of Philosophy (1962–1967), he ensured that reformist thinking did not escape the party's ideological control. His defining achievement, the 5-volume Philosophical Encyclopedia (1960–1970), was a product of this very tension. It assembled vast knowledge, yet every entry held meaning only within the framework of Marxism-Leninism, and the editor's red pen, as in the case of Yuri Levada's entry on 'fascism', set firm limits on scholarly autonomy. The encyclopedia stands as the monument that codified the official knowledge system of Soviet philosophy during the Thaw.