In the history of European communist dictatorships, the Albanian case deserves particular attention. Half a century of Albanian communism saw an attempt to apply the model of forceful industrialisation, combined with a brutal and multifarious indoctrination of society, to a backward country which had lived in traditional tribal structures. In Albania, the model of power which was called Stalinist in Europe proved particularly durable and impossible to verify through demographic and generational changes. This work is the first to analyse the process of the ideologisation of the state and its impact on the economic, social and cultural life. An important asset of the book is its extensive use of Albanian source materials as well as works of Albanian historians.