"Socialism in its various manifestations is now the world's dominant political and economic ideology," says World Editor John Elson, who edited this week's eleven-page report on the proliferation of the left. To back up his statement, Elson had at hand some formidable evidence: a foot-high pile of reports filed by 24 TIME correspondents around the world who assessed the consequences of the global revolution.

For many of our correspondents, working on this report was the culmination of a deep, ongoing interest in socialism. Eastern Europe Bureau Chief David Aikman, for example, concentrated on modern Russian and Chinese history while a doctoral student at the University of Washington. As our Hong Kong correspondent, he covered the People's Republic of China. Traveling in Eastern Europe for this week's story, Aikman talked with a variety of individuals, from tractor drivers on collective farms to bank managers, and found that "few people had given a thought to socialism as a philosophical entity, and none were really able to tell me what they thought socialism meant."

One of the fascinations of compiling such a story was documenting the startling contrasts of worldwide socialism. While Moscow Bureau Chief Marsh Clark watched Soviet President

Leonid Brezhnev receive visitors in a gilt room once used by Catherine the Great. Correspondent Lee Griggs recalled witnessing the beginnings of a dozen socialist countries when he was our man in Africa from 1959 to 1962 and again from 1972 to 1977. "The ceremonies, which were usually held in the soccer stadium of the new capital city, were full of joy," says Griggs. "At midnight, as the old colonial flag was lowered and the new flag was raised, the crowd would cheer and fireworks would greet the birth of a nation. Yet when I revisited those countries a few years later, the promises of socialism had become the ploys of power politics."

The special report was written by Associate Editor Burton Pines and researched by Ursula Nadasdy de Gallo. Pines, who taught European history at the University of Wisconsin and served as our Eastern Europe bureau chief from 1970 to 1971, also conceived the remarkable map that accompanies the story. Designed by Paul Pugliese, the head of our map department, and researched by Noel McCoy, the map shows the economic system, standard of living, and degree of political freedom in 134 countries. The result is a visual representation of the political phenomenon of our times.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.