The death of Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, is much more than an opportunity to recount his life and times. There are few political leaders whose actions are so entwined with a seismic shift in history that dramatically transformed the lives of tens of millions of people, for better and worse.
During his six years in power, with his twin policies of economic reform and political opening up – perestroika and glasnost – he set in motion the end the Cold War, the dissolution of the USSR and the transformation of the communist state into a nascent democracy. For the many nations subsumed by the Soviet Union, it offered the opportunity to reclaim their national sovereignty, and for Russians it led to a long period of chaos, poverty and the emergence of a robber baron state.
Mikhail Gorbachev with Boris Yeltsin, who took over control of Russia after the Soviet Union collapsed.Credit:AP
Gorbachev’s upbringing led him to the realisation that he had no choice but to pursue reform. He grew up in rural poverty where the dysfunction of the economy and the repression of the state had dire consequences for his family. When he ventured to Moscow for further education, he remained outwardly loyal to the communist regime, but began questioning the system. The questions were only encouraged when he was exposed to former Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev’s famous “secret speech”, which denounced Joseph Stalin’s personality cult and use of violence and persecution.
Gorbachev came to see the enormous divide that existed between the day-to-day circumstances of the average, destitute Soviet citizen and the propaganda of the party and leadership, which endlessly trumpeted the triumph of communism over the West.
When he became general secretary of the Communist Party in 1985, he rapidly began to reshape it in ways he hoped would lift the economy out of its torpor and its societal norms away from central control, corruption and secrecy. While the West came to admire this new style of leadership, his internal critics became increasingly vocal. Gorbachev was later to admit he made mistakes but, at the time, there was no precedent for transforming such a large moribund economy and repressed society. It was a social experiment on a scale and at a speed that had never before been attempted.
History is likely to view Gorbachev well in this project. It may not have been his intention to break up the Soviet Union, but the process occurred with relatively little conflict, with the exception of Yugoslavia, which descended into war. Optimists in the West referred to end of the communist bloc as the “end of history” and the triumph of liberalism.
But within Russia, Gorbachev’s reforms, regrettably, did not stick. President Vladimir Putin used the chaos that began under him and continued with Russia’s first post-Cold War leader, Boris Yeltsin, to bring about an authoritarian regime that has once again shut down any form a dissent. The economy is much more decentralised than under the Soviet Union, but it still does not generate enough wealth to keep its population prosperous. And in a sad twist of historical fate, Gorbachev has died as the threat of a resurgence in the Cold War, as a result of the Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, is higher than at any time since the 1980s.
Since his time in office, Gorbachev’s reputation has grown in the West, while increasingly diminishing in Russia. Putin, who as a KGB chief in East Germany felt the humiliation of the end of the USSR, referred to it as “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century”.
But despite what his detractors say, Gorbachev was a towering figure of 20th century history. The world would be a better place if his attempts to open up the Russian economy and free its people had ultimately proved more durable.
Gay Alcorn sends an exclusive newsletter to subscribers each week. Sign up to receive her Note from the Editor.
Most Viewed in World
Source: Read Full Article
