Lysenkoism: Politics Broke Soviet Genetics

Lysenkoism is the historical example of how political ideology and state power replaced empirical genetics with a politically palatable but scientifically false program, producing crop failures, famine exacerbation, and persecution of dissenting scientists. It shows how incentives and party backing — not evidence — can make pseudoscience a governance instrument. — Understanding Lysenkoism matters because it is a direct historical warning about the social and political conditions that let ideology trump methodology, with implications for modern debates over science policy, biosecurity, and AI governance.