66 SOCIAL SCIENTIST for the first time, mention is made of Leger being a member of the French Communist Party. The above examples have been give to illustrate the policies of intolerance, sectarianism, distortion and wrong interpretation of Marxian aesthetics towards art that dominated the Soviet scene, especially from the middle of the thirties to the fifties. The twentieth party congress and the subsequent developments eased the way for the arts in the sixties. Many of the artists were rehabilitated and their works published. Unfortunately, this period too was short-lived. The reason was not far to seek. Instead of wiping out the negative tendencies, only some of their symptoms were done away with; the bureaucracy remained firmly entrenched in their seats of power. For that reason many of the areas of art and culture in Soviet history are still viewed from the prism of the thirties and the forties. Creative freedom and free and open discussions are necessary pre-requisities for the intelligentsia of the most advanced socialist country. When the relationship between the party and the intellectual is revived on the basis of trust and friendly cooperation, only then it is possible to speak of a genuine socialist resurgence in art. This paper has dealt primarily with the Soviet experiments in art and culture of the twenties and their subsequent degeneration when they ceased to be the vanguard of world cultural movements. The first period saw the flowering of a cultural movement of unheard of proportions. Although some critics would have us believe that it died a natural death, subsequent developments show that this was not the case. The Soviet experiments are still influencing every field of art, and many of the dreams of the artists and architects of the twenties are today being realized. All this was possible because the party was aware of the fact that one cannot mechanically equate art with just any other type of production. Individuals with far-sightedness, who were arists in their own right, headed the party machinery and did all in their power to assist these cultural movements. Later developments prove that bureaucratization in art and incompetent meddling can do immense damage both to the artists and to their works. This is not to say that the party and government are separate from, or antagonistic to, arts and that their policy should be one of indifference and laissez-faire. This is only to state that faith, trust and understanding on the part of the state are essential prerequisites to bring out the best in the artist. Every new phenomenon in art and culture has to be analysed