Developments in Soviet and post-Soviet politics

Developments in Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics Also available from Palgrave Macmillan Patrick Dunleavy, Andrew Gamble and Gillian Peele ( eds) DEVELOPMENTS IN BRITISH POLITICS 3 Peter A. Hall, Jack Hayward and Howard Machin (eds) DEVELOPMENTS IN FRENCH POLITICS Gillian Peele, Christopher Bailey and Bruce Cain (eds) DEVELOPMENTS IN AMERICAN POLITICS Gordon Smith, William E. Paterson, Stephen Padgett and Peter H. Merkl (eds) DEVELOPMENTS IN GERMAN POLITICS Forthcoming Patrick Dunleavy ANALYSING BRITISH POLITICS Stephen White, Judy Batt and Paul Lewis (eds) DEVELOPMENTS IN EASTERN EUROPEAN POLITICS Developments in Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics Second Edition Edited by Stephen White Alex Pravda Zvi Gitelman M MACMILLAN Selection and editorial matter© Stephen White, Alex Pravda and Zvi Gitelman 1990, 1992 Individual chapters (in order)© Stephen White, Alfred B. Evans Jr, John P. Willerton Jr, Ronald J. Hill, Jeffrey W. Hahn, William E. Butler. Zvi Gitelman, Thomas F. Remington, David Wedgwood Benn, Peter Rutland, Mary Buckley, Alex Pravda, David Mandel, T. H. Rigby 1992 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London WlP 9HE. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. First published 1990 as Developments in Soviet Politics Reprinted 1990, 1991 Second edition (Developments in Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics) 1992 Published by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world ISBN 978-0-333-57707-3 ISBN 978-1-349-22191-2 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-22191-2 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Contents List of Illustrations and Maps List of Tables Preface Notes on the Contributors Glossary of Abbreviations and Terms X xi xii Xlll xvi PART ONE: THE HisTORICAL AND CuLTURAL CoNTExT 1 Towards a Post-Soviet Politics? Stephen White The August Coup The Gorbachev Agenda Towards a Pluralist Politics? 2 The Crisis of Marxism-Leninism Alfred B. Evans, Jr The Pillars of Orthodoxy Efforts at Reform and Revitalisation Between the Past and the Future Divisive Issues Conclusion 2 3 7 14 22 23 26 33 38 41 PART Two: THE CoNTEMPORARY PoLITICAL SYSTEM 3 Executive Power and Political Leadership John P. Willerton, Jr The Traditional Soviet System An authoritarian political legacy The nomenklatura elite Momentum for Change Reorganisations and personnel changes Fundamental system restructuring The Divided Political Elite v 44 47 47 49 50 50 52 54 vi Contents Gorbachev and the New Union Presidency Pre-coup institutional arrangements The August 1991 coup and its aftermath Political Log-jam and a Society in Transition 59 59 63 64 4 The Communist Party and After Ronald J. Hill The CPSU Before Gorbachev The Party's Political Role Ideology and the party The party and the state Party Structures The Apparatchiki Party Discipline and Indiscipline The Party in Decline Membership Finances Party prestige The Party and Restructuring Intra-party democratisation The 28th Congress The Emerging Party System 68 5 State Institutions in Transition Jeffrey W. Hahn The Background to Reform Elections The Reformed State System: National Level Republican and Local Government 88 88 93 98 103 68 70 71 72 72 75 76 77 77 78 79 80 80 82 84 6 The Rule of Law and the Legal System William E. Butler 107 Towards the Rule of Law 107 Towards the Improvement of Legislation 108 The Legal Profession 110 The Courts 112 Thejudges 112 People's assessors 113 Guiding explanations 114 The Procuracy 114 Police and Investigative Agencies 116 Other Law Enforcement Bodies 117 State arbitrazh 117 Administrative comi~sn 118 People's guards and comrades' courts 119 Citizen initiative 119 Commonwealth, Community and Republic Law 120 Contents vii 7 Nations, Republics and Commonwealth Zvi Gitelman The Soviet 'National Question' The Ethnic Map of the USSR Nationalities Policy: Ideology and History Soviet Nationality Policy Current Issues and Developments Conclusion 122 123 126 131 136 140 145 8 Towards a Participatory Politics? Thomas F. Remington 'People Power' and the Collapse of the Soviet Union Participation and Recruitment Before Perestroika Traditional Forms of Mass Participation Gorbachev and Democratisation The New Electoral Politics 147 147 149 154 158 166 9 Glasnost' and the Media David Wedgwood Benn The Media and Propaganda System Prior to 1985 Glasnost' after 1985: Its Origins and Meaning Glasnost' in Action, 1986-90 The Media Legislation of 1990 Problems of the Media Law, 1990-1 Glasnost': The Historical Perspective 174 176 180 185 189 192 195 PART THREE: PATTERNS oF PuBLIC PoLicY 10 Economic Crisis and Reform Peter Rutland The Origins of the Soviet Economic System Economic Performance The System of Central Planning Reform Attempts before Gorbachev Gorbachev's Economic Reforms The learning phase, 1985-6 Towards a new planning system Promoting new forms of ownership Increased international integration The Struggle for Market Reform The perils of perestroika The battle of the programmes The Emerging Post-Soviet Economy The breakdown of central planning Monetary and fiscal crisis The international debt crisis The break-up of the Union 200 200 202 205 207 207 207 209 211 213 214 214 216 219 219 222 223 224 viii 11 Contents Social Change and Social Policy Mary Buckley The Legacy of Perestroika and Glasnost' The Making of Social Policies From Social Justice to Social Protection Welfare Provision Employment Housing Health care New Social Issues Crime Drugs Prostitution Conclusion 12 The Politics of Foreign Policy Alex Pravda Why and How Security and Foreign Policy Matter Gorbachev and Foreign Policy Policy Institutions and Processes Security Policy Political Concerns and Debates Republicanisation 227 227 229 230 232 232 235 238 242 242 243 245 247 250 251 254 257 261 264 272 PART FouR: PERSPECTIVES oN SoviET AND PosT-SoviET Pouncs 13 Post-Perestroika: Revolution from Above v. Revolution from Below David Mandel 'Revolution from Above' v. 'Revolution from Below' Perestroika or the 'Socialist' Phase of the 'Revolution from Above' Bureaucratic Resistance to Perestroika Popular Resistance to Perestroika Perestroika Collapses Under Its Own Contradictions The Advent of the Post-Perestroika Phase of the 'Revolution from Above' The Forces of the 'Revolution from Below' 14 Reconceptualising the Soviet System T. H. Rigby Totalitarian and Post-totalitarian Models Class Models Bureaucratic and Other Models The Soviet System: A Retrospective Evaluation Revolution from above The unleashing of politics 278 279 281 284 287 290 292 296 300 301 304 307 310 310 311 Contents Ideas, interests and classes Modernisation, industrial society and convergence The retrospective view from within Guide to Further Reading Bibliography Index IX 314 316 317 320 326 339 List of Illustrations and Maps Illustrations 4.1 5.1 The structure of the CPSU (to 1991) The USSR Congress of People's Deputies and Supreme Soviet (1989-91) 74 99 Maps 1 The Commonwealth of Independent States 2 The Baltic States 3 The Caucasian Republics X xviii 128 130 List of Tables 1.1 3.1 5.1 7.1 8.1 10.1 10.2 11.1 11.2 The Commonwealth of Independent States, 1992 Composition of leading advisory and policy-setting councils to the USSR President, 1990-1 Social composition of the USSR Supreme Soviet (1984), Congress of People's Deputies (1989) and the USSR Supreme Soviet (1989) The major Soviet nationalities, 1989 Electoral performance of obkom and kraikom first secretaries in the 1989 elections of USSR deputies Soviet economic performance, 1971-88 (average annual rates of growth, percentages) Soviet economic performance, 1986-1991 (average annual rates of growth, percentages) Infant mortality rates in the Russian Federation and Turkmenia Infant mortality rates in selected countries xi 6 57 101 125 169 203 221 239 240 Preface In our preface to the first edition of this book we explained that this was above all a guide for students, but hoped it might be considered more than 'just' a textbook. As befitted a volume on developments, we made no attempt to cover every aspect of what could still be described as the Soviet political system; our aim, then and now, was to allow ourselves a little more room in which to concentrate upon the more important changes in a rapidly evolving system, and to deal with the (often controversial) issues of interpretation to which they give rise. We also thought it proper, dealing with issues of this kind, to allow for a diversity of approach within a common framework. As we wrote in 1990, our assumptions about Soviet politics were 'changing almost daily'. But not even we could claim to have foretold the changes with which we deal in this second edition, with the end of Communist Party rule and of the USSR itself. This is accordingly a very different book: all of the chapters have been rewritten, most of them are entirely different, and several of the contributors as well as the subjects with which they deal are new to this edition. Our aim, however, remains the same: to offer an interpretive framework for what is now a group of political systems whose evolution - in an age of nuclear weapons and telecommunications - matters almost as much to the outside world as to their own citizens. Once again, for this second edition, we would like to thank our chapter authors for their contributions and for their willingness to provide us with revisions almost to the date of publication so that this book can be as up-to-date as possible. We would like particularly to thank our publisher, Steven Kennedy, whose commitment to this series and to this book in particular has been a great inspiration. We hope that not just our students, but a wider circle of scholars and members of the general public, will find that the outcome justifies the effort that has been invested in it. Stephen White Alex Pravda Zvi Gitelman xii Notes on the Contributors David Wedgwood Benn worked for many years in the BBC World Service, where he eventually became head of its Yugoslav section. He is the author of Persuasion and Soviet Politics (1989), an historical study of the Soviet approach to communication, and has also written on Soviet affairs in The World Today, Soviet Studies, the Journal of Communist Studies, International Affairs and other journals. He first visited the USSR in 1955 and most recently in 1991. Mary Buckley is Senior Lecturer in Politics at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. Her books include Soviet Social Scientists Talking (1986), Women and Ideology in the Soviet Union (1989) and Perestroika and Soviet Women (edited, 1992); her contribution to this volume draws on work supported by the British Academy and the British Council. William E. Butler is Professor of Comparative Law in the University of London and Director of the Centre for the Study of Socialist Legal Systems. His books include Russian Law (1992) and Basic Legal Documents of the Russian Federation (1992), and he has acted as adviser to the USSR, Russian and Lithuanian governments, to the European Community and the World Bank. Alfred B. Evans Jr is Professor of Political Science at California State University, Fresno. His articles have appeared in Slavic Review, Soviet Studies, Problems of Communism, Studies in Comparative Communism and elsewhere, and he has coedited Restructuring Soviet Ideology: Gorbachev's New Thinking (1991). Zvi Gitelman is Professor of Political Science and Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. A specialist in Soviet political sociology and ethnic issues, his books include Jewish Nationality and Soviet Politics (1972), Public Opinion in European Socialist Systems (coedited, 1977), Becoming Israelis (1982) and A Century of Ambivalence: The Jews in Russia and the Soviet Union (1988). Jeffrey W. Hahn is Professor of Political Science at Villanova University, Philadelphia. The author of Soviet Grassroots (1988) and of Xlll xiv Notes on the Contributors contributions to journals and symposia on Soviet elections and local government, he is currently working on a study of the politics of transition in the Russian city of Yaroslavl. Ronald J. Hill is Professor of Soviet Government at Trinity College, Dublin. His books include The USSR: Politics, Economics and Society (1989) and Communism under the Knife: Surgery or Autopsy? (1991); he is also the author of numerous contributions to professional journals and symposia, with particular reference to local government and the CPSU. David Mandel is a member of the Department of Political Science at the Universite du Quebec a Montreal, Canada. His books include Petrograd Workers and the Fall of the Old Regime (1983), Petrograd Workers and the Soviet Seizure of Power (1984) and most recently Perestroika and Soviet Society: Rebirth of the Soviet Labour Movement (1991). He is also editor of the English edition of Socialist Alternatives and a regular contributor to International Viewpoints and Inprecor. Alex Pravda is Fellow of St Antony's College and Lecturer in Soviet and East European Politics at Oxford University. He was previously Director of the Soviet foreign policy programme at the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House). His most recent books include British-Soviet Relations since the 1970s (coedited, 1990), Perestroika: Soviet Domestic and Foreign Policies (coedited, 1990) and The End of Soviet Foreign Policy and After (1992). Thomas F. Remington is Professor of Political Science at Emory University, Atlanta. His books include Politics in the USSR (with Frederick Barghoorn, 1986), The Truth of Authority: Ideology and Communication in the Soviet Union (1988) and Politics and the Soviet System (edited, 1989); he is also a member of the board of Russian Review. T. H. Rigby is Professor Emeritus and University Fellow in the Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, Canberra. His books on Soviet politics include Communist Party Membership in the USSR 1917-1967 (1968) and Lenin's Government: Sovnarkom 1917-1922 (1979) as well as two recent collections of essays, Political Elites in the USSR (1990) and The Changing Soviet System: Mono-organisational socialism from its origins to Gorbachev's restructuring (1990). Peter Rutland is an Associate Professor of Government at Wesleyan University, Connecticut. He is the author of The Myth of the Plan (1985) and The Politics of Economic Stagnation in the USSR (1992). In 1991-2 he was a visiting professor at Charles University and an adviser to the Czechoslovak Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Notes on the Contributors XV Stephen White is Professor of Politics and a member of the Institute of Soviet and East European Studies at the University of Glasgow, Scotland. His recent books include the third edition of Communist and Post-Communist Political Systems: An Introduction (with others, 1990), New Directions in Soviet History (edited, 1991) and Gorbachev and After (3rd ed, 1992), and he has acted as general editor of the proceedings of the Harrogate World Congress for Soviet and East European Studies. John P. Willerton, Jr is a member of the Department of Political Science at the University of Arizona, Tucson. His articles have appeared in Slavic Review, Soviet Studies, Studies in Comparative Communism and other journals and professional symposia. A specialist on Soviet elite politics and centre-periphery relations, he is the author of Patronage and Politics in the USSR (1992). Glossary of Abbreviations and Terms Advokatura Apparat Apparatchik Arbitrazh Bolshevik cc CIA CIS CPD CPE CPSU CSCE Glasnost' GNP Gorkom Gosagroprom Gosplan Gospriemka Gossnab Goszakaz INF Ispolkom Jurisconsult Kadry KGB Khozraschet Kolkhoz Komsomol Advocacy Party administrative apparatus Full-time party official Tribunal system for disputes between state enterprises Radical ('majority') faction of Russian Social Democratic Labour (later Communist) Party Central Committee Central Intelligence Agency (USA) Commonwealth of Independent States Congress of People's Deputies Centrally planned economy Communist Party of the Soviet Union Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe Openness, publicity Gross national product City party committee State Agroindustrial Committee State Planning Committee State quality control State Committee on Supplies State order Intermediate-range nuclear force Executive committee of a soviet Legal adviser to ministry, enterprise, etc. Cadres, staff Committee of State Security Cost accounting Collective farm Young Communist League xvi Glossary of Abbreviations and Terms Krai Menshevik NEP Nomenklatura Oblast Obshchestvennik Okrug Perestroika Plenum Podmena PPO Pravo Pravo kontrolya Raikom RSFSR Sblizhenie Sliyanie USSR Val WTO Zakon Zastoi xvii Territory Moderate (minority) faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labour (later Communist) Party New Economic Policy (1921-8) List of party-controlled posts Region, province Activist Area, district Restructuring Full (plenary) meeting Substitution, supplantation Primary party organisation Law (in general sense) Party's right of supervision District party committee Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic (now Russian Federation) Drawing together (of nationalities) Fusion (of nationalities) Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Gross output Warsaw Treaty Organisation (Statute) law Stagnation ~ CIS: ~ IS I I 1 flluury 1092 • Aep1blicaa capllals o or•er major cities e)c "2>. · · ~ ~ 100 150lm MAP 1 The Commonwealth of Independent States