How Did Mikhail Gorbachev Impact The Soviet Union

This was a policy that allowed open discussion of social and political issues. (source N). This policy also led to elections taking place. These elections led to the power of the communist party being reduced. Demokratizatsiia was a small policy of Gorbachev and this refers to the new voting process. There was now to be secret ballad voting and this led to the creation of a new parliament. (source I) This policy also led to freedom of the press in the soviet union. Gorbachev began to “reduce state control over the media.” (source F). This was his way of allowing more freedom of the press. Gorbachev hoped that his policy of Glasnost would help the common people understand the Social and economic changes that he was making. Gorbachev said “Communists want the truth, always and under all circumstances.” (source H). Gorbachev hoped his policy of Glasnost would help the communists see the truth.

Just a year later, Gorbachev had become the youngest member of the Politburo. The Politburo is the executive committee for a number of communist political parties. The first ever Politburo was created by the Bolshevik party in 1917. Gorbachev worked closely under General Secretary Yuri Andropov watching how he succeeded in the Politburo. When Andropov died, Gorbachev was quick to replace him for the position that he so closely eyed. Unfortunately Mikhail lost to Konstantin Chernenko, nevertheless Mikhail wouldn't give up for what he worked so hard for. 13 months later Chernenko died, opening the doors for Gorbachev to become the General Secretary of the Politburo at the very young age of 54. He was the only general secretary in the history of the Soviet Union to have been born during Communist era.

The Soviet Union was none the less held together by "…powerful central institutions, pressure for ideological conformity, and the threat of force." (Baylis & Smith, 2001.) Therefore, these new reforms could not overpower the previous ‘seventy years' of soviet rule.

During the early 1980s the Soviet Union would have three leaders in less than three years. Brezhnev, Andropov, and Chernenko were all solid communist leaders, but also older and all died within their first year of office. In March 1985 a communist reformer named Mikhail Gorbachev was appointed as the Soviet Union’s last president. The Soviet government knew they couldn’t afford another short term leader. Gorbachev was fifty four was he took office. When Gorbachev assumed power the Soviet Union was in a state of stagnation. Gorbachev wanted to reform the economy and modernize the political structure. In order to help the Soviet Union prosper Gorbachev introduced three policies of reform. These policies were glasnost, perestroika, and

This Communist Party has strived to oppose capitalism and socialism from plaguing Soviet territory. In the 60 or so years since becoming the ruling party, The Communist Party of the Soviet Union now stands under the head of Mikhail Gorbachev ready to serve and preserve the Soviet Union. Here the most powerful people in the USSR, including representatives from all soviet countries, begin to create legislature on how the union will be steered.

Under the badge of democratization, restructuring has now encompassed politics, the economy, spiritual life, and ideology.” Both Regan and Gorbachev struggled to get along with one another as well as agreeing on the development of a Strategic Defense Initiative. Reagan wanted this, while on the other side, Mikhail did not. When it came down to it Gorbachev ended up agreeing with Reagan in the year of 1987, making it the first ever mutual agreement on nuclear weapons reduction. With everything he was doing Mikhail ended up becoming the first president of the Soviet Union on March 15, 1990 with election coming from the Congress of People’s Duties. His leadership skills and his help he contributed to the overall betterment of the world were so good that he ended up winning a Nobel Peace Prize. In the year of 1991 Mikhail was captured in a coup by Prime Minister Pavlov whom he had hired to help him balance power with Yeltsin; all because he wanted more power. When he had returned home people didn’t trust him due to the fact that they thought he was working with the coup leaders. The Soviet Union in turn crumbled in the late year of 1991, making Gorbachev hand over his power to the Yeltsin and resign as

Glasnost, Joseph Stalin and “Prague Spring” were influential in bringing or attempting to bring transformation to Russian society. Some attempts were more successful and unopposed then others. When establishing transformation of a long-standing ideal, it is not always accepted with open arms. Joseph Stalin was betrayed by Nazi Germany, which in turn created an air of mistrust the government foreign or otherwise, as well as maintains a chokehold on his country. The consequences of his mistrust were establishing a brutal regime that wanted to continue the status quo.

Gorbachev began to implement g lasnost and p erestroika in the USSR. G lasnost ,meaning openness, allowed more freedom of expression in the USSR. This was the end of Stalin’s repressive laws in the USSR. P erestroika, meaning restructuring, began the decentralization of the socialist government and economy which allowed a some form a “free market” and “self government.” Ultimately the freedom of expression allowed for criticism of the way the government was failing to reform the economy and allowed people to organize to protest.

As George Washington once said, “If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter” is a concept that is connected to the policy that was appointed in Soviet Union. Mikhail Gorbachev, the new leader of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic launched three policies in 1985, to modernize and revitalize the Soviet Union. The three policies were Perestroika, a political movement for reformation within the Communist party, Glasnost, the open discussion of political/social issues, and Demokratizatsia, which enabled them to make changes by permitting wider access to the government (Cold War Perestroika and Glasnost). The Glasnost policy brought enormous changes, politically and socially in the Soviet Union. It brought openness to the media and reduced the traditional constraints on the flow of government.

Mikhail Gorbachev stepped onto to the Russian political scene in 1985 as Leader of the Soviet Union. He was very different from the other leaders who had come before him because of their lust and hunger for power. Gorbachev felt that it was more important to promote peace throughout the world than to get what he and the leaders who came before him desired. This desire in Gorbachev's heart eventually led to the tearing down of the Berlin wall, the end of Communism in several European countries, and eventually to the end of the Cold War in 1991. Gorbachev decided that he wasn’t going to force his ideals upon the European nations, and because of that Communism quickly fell.

In one week, the summer of 1991, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic, became history. The forces of reform unleashed by President Mikhail Gorbachev in the mid 1980’s generated a democratic movement. “Mr. Gorbachev may be revered for the democratic forces he unleashed- his policies of perestroika, or reconstructing, and glasnost, or openness. However, his failure to put food on Soviet tables and his reluctance to move boldly on economic reforms doomed him to be a failure'; (Sieff). His economic policies threw his country into even more turmoil and chaos, as the different nationalities used their new freedoms to move away from the union. “Gorbachev sincerely wanted to reform the communist system, but he did

Under his leadership, the Soviet Union has abandoned its confrontational style of world politics and become the driving force in improving east-west relations. He has shown himself to be a great communicator and visionary in addressing problems at home and abroad. But, Gorbachev’s unrealized ambitions made him the “unwanted visionary”. Gorbachev's reforms devastated the Soviet Union and led to the downfall of the communist empire.But, Gorbachev is not completely at fault. By the time Mikhail Gorbachev was appointed Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1985 the U.S.S.R. was already on the verge of shattering . Soviet economy was slowly becoming stagnant, with military spending skyrocketing.

Such is the case with Gorbachev. Moran (2012) suggested that Gorbachev and his supposed attitudes towards democracy and freedom that was outlawed during Soviet rule may not be as liberating as once thought. He suggested that " Gorbachev himself was not as much of a liberal democrat as he is often portrayed in the West. He used force to try to suppress the independence movement in the Baltics, and otherwise sought to preserve the Soviet regime, not end it. He was certainly much less ruthless and repressive than his predecessors. But that is judging him by a very low standard of comparison."

The derailed, scrambled mess of the USSR that was inherited by Gorbachev from gaining Party leadership in 1985 was a daunting challenge. The legacy of Stalinism, a broken economy, a crippled political system, and the terror of Gulags and public’s fear of dissent certainly did prove too insurmountable to solve that the state collapsed in 1991 . Yet, this did not stop Gorbachev from attempting to preserve the system through his initiatives of perestroika and glasnost, which involuntarily led to the USSR’s demise. The former was an effort to restructure the economy by rejuvenating it, but what is done to the economy is inextricably linked to political changes. The goal was to redesign the Soviet’s heavy centralized government so that it was more open and responsive to market forces, thus ending the old regime’s price controls and monopolies . The nature of perestroika’s dramatic restructuring was painfully slow for Russians that they would later gather together to protest the lethargic adjustments and long lines they waited in as a result . At the same time, it uprooted the social and political system built on Communist rule so that elections were now injected with political freedom based on Leninist principles. Thus, Gorbachev attempted to imbed democratic seeds into the Soviet Union through perestroika because he stated that the

After revealing such shortcomings, the goal of glasnost is to foster change and legitimacy in the current regime. However, Gorbachev’s plan backfired. Citizens of the Soviet Union began to question the very political system in place and ethnic groups began seeking greater freedom from Russian domination.