Chekism

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Chekism (Russian: Чекизм) was the form of counterintelligence state widely present in the Soviet Union by which secret police, counterintelligence and internal security services (originally the Cheka, hence the name, but most famously the KGB) strongly controlled all spheres of society. Similar circumstances exist in some post-Soviet states, particularly Russia. The term encompasses both the ideological underpinnings justifying often arbitrary repression as well as the political situation where security service members occupy high-level political offices and a lack of civilian control over their activities (in extreme cases, the opposite). The term is sometimes also applied to other Eastern Bloc security services (long-serving East German security chief Erich Mielke was fond of calling himself a Chekist), and, presently, to the federal government of Russia under Vladimir Putin (himself a former KGB officer). The name is derived from Cheka, the colloquial name of the All-Russian Extraordinary...

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