People's Socialist Republic of Albania

Albania, 1946–1991. Draft, not yet reviewed

The People's Socialist Republic of Albania was the communist state that existed in Albania from 11 January 1946 to 29 April 1991. Originally founded as the People's Republic of Albania from 1946 to 1976, it was governed by the Party of Labour of Albania (PPSh), which had a constitutionally enshrined monopoly on state power. The state was first led by Enver Hoxha from 1946 to 1985, and then by Ramiz Alia from 1985 to 1991. The first multi-party elections in Socialist Albania took place on 31 March 1991, and the Republic of Albania was proclaimed on 29 April 1991.

Seat of power: Tirana

No rulers documented for this era yet.

Culture

• At the time the only Muslim-majority country in Europe, it declared itself the world's first atheist state in 1967.
• It was the only Warsaw Pact member to formally withdraw from the alliance before 1990, an action which was occasioned by the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968.
• The government implemented reforms which were aimed at modernizing Albania, and they resulted in significant gains in the areas of industry, agriculture, education, the arts, and culture, which contributed to a general increase in the Albanian population's standard of living. However, these developments coincided with political repression by the secret police, the Sigurimi, for the purposes of preventing a counter-revolution, which included dismissal from employment, imprisonment in forced labor camps and executions.

Picture

Gjirokastër is a city in southern Albania, and its old town is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Image: Name: Armin Flickr: flickr.com/octopuzz/, CC BY-SA 2.0, file

Sources

• People's Socialist Republic of Albania (Wikipedia)
• People's Socialist Republic of Albania (Wikidata)
• About the picture (Wikipedia)

Text adapted from the Wikipedia articles listed as sources, CC BY-SA 4.0.