This set of studies edited by Susanne Schattenberg and Martin Sabrow brings an excellent opportunity to rethink „real socialism“ and the role of the communist leaders in the creation of this phenomenon. It features ten detailed essays devoted to Josip Broz Tito, Todor Zhivkov, János Kádár, Leonid Brezhnev, Nicolae Ceaușescu, Gustáv Husák, Edward Gierek, Erich Honecker, Wojciech Jaruzelski and Mikhail Gorbachev. The editors of the volume decided to put particular emphasis on three issues. The first is the cultural and social background that shaped future communist rulers. Secondly, they inquire into the style of exercising power and the sources of its legitimacy, both referring to its social dimension and, in a narrower sense, understood as support they enjoyed in Moscow. Thirdly, the authors attempt to reconstruct the political programmes of the leaders of Eastern Europe, asking what exactly was this „other socialism“, sometimes labelled bigosowy socjalizm or gulyáskommunizmus (pp. 10–11).

The title Die letzten Generalsekretäre seems a bit misleading because not all the main protagonists of the book were actually the last to step down. The heroes of the book, however, are those communist leaders who came to rule when the revolutionary faith in realising utopia evaporated and was replaced by a much less alluring belief in the defence of the status quo.

When taking ten different political biographies as a basis for consideration, one may expect significant difficulties with generalisations. Yugoslav leader Tito offers a perfect example of a biography that is very different from the others. The system of government he created was based on his unique, virtually monarchical charisma. In effect, he was able to treat political crises as paradoxical opportunities to strengthen his power. His uniqueness, and hence, his incomparability, lay also in Yugoslavia’s actual independence from Moscow since 1948. Essays about Brezhnev or Gorbachev may also be treated differently because both of them remained actual sovereigns of the entire political system in Eastern Europe, having at their disposal several instruments to enforce Soviet sovereignty upon the leaders of the satellite countries.

Nonetheless, from the plurality of singular stories a fascinating model emerges that can be justifiably called spätsozialistische Herrschaft. Its leading protagonists appear to be rather unimpressive people from poor families, poorly educated, and at the same time convinced of communism’s historical mission. During the period of „real socialism“, the beginning of which can be situated in 1961-1962, each dictator tried to reform the political system and, above all, the economy. Kadar’s új gazdasági mechanizmus has become the best known economic reform, but similar steps towards timid introduction of market elements have been reported all around the bloc. It really is a pity, though, that the authors of the volume show little interest in tracing mutual inspirations and interconnections between the bloc countries. As much as it is true that Moscow had to give the green light, the details of the reform’s implementation differed from country to country. Undoubtedly, however, an important similarity between communist dictators was that after a period of revolutionary enthusiasm, largely enforced by terror, they all saw the need to make stability and material prosperity for the people the general line of their parties.

The experience of Stalinism fundamentally influenced and ultimately transformed the understanding of the role of a leader. Leonid Brezhnev, the most important Soviet leader after Lenin and Stalin, exercised power as primus inter pares, regularly and willingly discussing his decisions with his comrades. And even if the practice of exercising power did not converge into a similar model in all the countries, Eastern Europe’s late socialist dictators tended to begin their rule as compromise candidates of competing factions. Some of them were to the very end convinced that they were only a part of a managerial collective. This is firmly demonstrated by the words of Honecker from the early 1990s, quoted by Sabrow: „I did not have the power at all. I was only able to make decisions that were taken collectively“ (p. 213).

„Faceless, boring, gray“ – this description suits the good many of the book's heroes. As individuals, those communist leaders were uninteresting, devoid of charisma and imagination. They were not, however, free from personal ambition. Nicolae Ceaușescu, once a favourite of the West, who opposed to the invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968, was inspired by North Korea in the early 1970s. As a result, his version of „real socialism“, analysed by Stefano Bottoni, became radically xenophobic and, over time, also economically autarkic. His cult reached grotesque levels, and Romanians hated him for the extreme deterioration of living conditions during the 1980s. Shot by revolting soldiers in December 1989, Ceaușescu symbolised the communist anachronism in the most striking way. The fate of Gustáv Husák, probably the only true intellectual in this group, was different, as Michal Pullmann shows. After the invasion of Warsaw Pact troops, he was chosen to pacify Czechoslovakia and introduce „normalisation“. Not only did he manage to achieve relative economic success, but he also succeeded in removing visible repression from public space and transferring it to the „expert level“. He was perceived as a relatively soft politician, but no less gray and dull than the others. Unlike his Romanian counterpart, however, he calmly resigned his position during the Velvet Revolution of December 1989.

Eric Hobsbawm claimed in Age of Extreme that the economic confrontation between the closed communist world and global markets was among the crucial reasons for the final collapse of communism as a system. As much as this is true, Die letzten Generalsekretäre also shows the importance of customary change in politics and how much the public appearance of the communist politicians changed under western influence. In 1971, Leonid Brezhnev appeared publicly in a blue tracksuit and sunglasses – a picture probably more shocking than Alexander Dubček’s photo in swimming trunks taken in the spring of 1968. The allegedly western style of governance – involving, for instance, spontaneous interactions with people – was especially visible in the case of Edward Gierek in Poland in the 1970s, and, most of all, of Mikhail Gorbachev in the second half of the 1980s. It also constitutes an important feature of the peculiar modernity labelled „real socialism“.

In the closing text devoted to Gorbachev, Jan C. Behrends concludes that Gorbachev’s abandonment of more thorough reforms in army and security apparatus and his failure to build institutions that endured beyond the end of his rule influenced the further development of Russia, eventually creating the foundations for Vladimir Putin’s rule (pp. 268-270). This conclusion rightly highlights the interconnection between the world of „real socialism“ and present-day politics. Yet at this point, one should take into account the limits of the communist politicians’ imagination, not only in the case of Gorbachev. The 1980s witnessed a dramatic search for a way out of the multidimensional crisis that the communist system found itself in. Gorbachev tried to transform reality, whereas, for instance, Honecker decided to deny it. Why did both of them fail?

One of the most important hints can be found in Sabrow’s text on the East German leader. Sabrow emphasises the importance of two factors: the dictator’s mistrust of his own people (p. 220) and the systematic ageing of the system, symbolised by the average age of the members of the SED Politbüro, which had risen to 67,3 years by 1989 (p. 213). Hence, stability appears to have been the crucial feature of „real socialism“. It was both the biggest achievement of the communist rulers and the very source of their defeat. Jan-Werner Müller argued in Contesting Democracy. Political Ideas in Twentieth-Century Europe that taming uncertainty constitutes the most important challenge of modernity. The history of European communism viewed from the biographical perspective of its leaders helps us understand why the communist leaders chose political, economic and social constancy for an answer.

The book has some weaker points: it lacks wider general conclusions, and not all the case studies are equally thorough and balanced. Nevertheless, this volume is undoubtedly a very inspiring read, not only for those specifically interested in political history and political studies, but also for those specialising in transnational exchanges and the social history of communism. The team of authors provides us with an innovative theoretical frame as well as some valuable information and interpretation, which could be especially useful for comparative research. The latter is still very much needed. Die letzten Generalsekretäre offers a firm foundation for the projects yet to come.