Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
net/publication/231910050
CITATIONS READS
15 648
1 author:
William Tompson
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)
77 PUBLICATIONS 734 CITATIONS
SEE PROFILE
Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:
All content following this page was uploaded by William Tompson on 04 May 2015.
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless
you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you
may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.
Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at
http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cup.
Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed
page of such transmission.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
Cambridge University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to British
Journal of Political Science.
http://www.jstor.org
B.J.Pol.S. 23, 77-105 Copyright? 1993 CambridgeUniversityPress
Printed in Great Britain
Nikita Khrushchev and Mikhail Gorbachev both pursued reformist policies during their respect-
ive periods as head of the CPSU. Although their policies were very different in substance,
the political problems they faced in prosecuting reform were quite similar. The discussion
here focuses on the obstacles facing reform-minded Soviet leaders and the options available
for overcoming them. Both Khrushchev and Gorbachev were dependent for their position
and for the implementation of their policies on a party-state apparat whose interests lay in
opposing radical reform and in limiting the leader's power. As a result both men were in
a particularly weak position from which to pursue reformist policies.
We were scared - really scared. We were afraid the thaw might unleash a flood, which
we wouldn't be able to control and which could drown us.
-N. S. Khrushchev,
Khrushchev Remembers: The Last Testament'
At first glance, it might appear that Nikita Khrushchev and Mikhail Gorbachev
have too little in common to permit a useful comparison of their careers as
reformers. The radicalization of Soviet politics after 1988 pushed the reform
process far beyond anything contemplated in Khrushchev's time. Nevertheless,
Soviet and Western observers have seen the Khrushchev period both as an
inspiration and as a cautionary tale for later reformers.2 During the early
phases of perestroika, Soviet discussions of economic reform often looked to
the experiences of the 1950s and 1960s.3 Not only external observers, but
the Soviet leaders of the 1980s themselves drew lessons from Khrushchev's
career. A comparison of these two reform attempts should help us to understand
better the sources of and obstacles to change in the Soviet system.
The discussion here is divided into three parts. First, a simple theoretical
schema for analysing reform processes in general is presented. Secondly, the
reform efforts of Khrushchev and Gorbachev are examined in terms of the
categories laid out in this schema. Finally, more general conclusions are drawn
on the basis of this examination, concentrating particularly on the reasons
why Khrushchev was ousted before he could do lasting damage to the Soviet
* Corpus Christi
College, Oxford. The author is indebted to Archie Brown, Mary McAuley
and an anonymous referee of this Journal for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this
article.
Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1974, pp. 78-9.
2 Thomas
Sherlock, 'Khrushchev Observed', Report on the USSR, 8 June 1990, p. 17.
3 See, for example, E. Ya. Zubkova, 'Uroki nezavershennykh povorotov 1956 i 1965 godov',
Voprosy istorii KPSS, 4 (April 1988); L. A. Openkin, 'Byli li povoroty v razvitii sovetskogo obsh-
chestva v 50-kh i 60-kh godakh?', Voprosy istorii KPSS, 8 (August 1988); and Gavriil Popov,,
'Dva tsveta vremeni, ili uroki Khrushcheva', Ogonek, 42 (October 1989), p. 14.
78 TOMPSON
WHAT IS REFORM?
The logical point of departure for any attempt to compare Khrushchev and
Gorbachev as reformers is to define precisely the term 'reform'. Reform repre-
sents a significant change in the political regime but falls short of transforming
it into something else. For the purposes of this article, it will be defined as
a policy deliberately undertaken to bring about a significant alteration in the
authoritative allocation of values within the political system, which broadens
access to the sources and instruments of power and authority (including control
over material resources, the employment of physical force and communica-
tions), but which nevertheless preserves the continuity and identity of the
regime.4A 'regime' is here understood as a group of political leaders pursuing
certain goals, by means of a strategy, implemented through certain institutions
and aimed at a particular constituency.5 Reform may involve changes in the
goals or strategies of the leaders, or in the institutions through which they
operate.6
Several implications follow from this definition of reform. The first is that
most leaders undertake reform policies at some time during their tenure in
office. Where Khrushchev and Gorbachev stand out among Soviet leaders is
in the wide range of issue areas over which they introduced clearly reformist
measures. Secondly, not all changes in access to the sources of power and
authority constitute reforms. Even largely inertial, conservative regimes are
not static in this respect: the immobilism and drift at the top during the late
in terms of the Soviet regime rather than (as is the case with many similar discussions) the Soviet
political system. Although the two phrases are sometimes used interchangeably, they are not the
same thing. Unlike political systems, regimes are 'wilful human agglomerations that actively
implement policies' and are capable of pursuing aims and of identifying and reacting to threats
to their survival (Alexander Motyl, Will the Non-Russians Rebel? State, Ethnicity and Stability
in the USSR (New York: Cornell University Press, 1987), p. x). Focusing on the regime (on
the actions and interests of individuals, groups and real institutions) rather than on the political
system as a unit of analysis is intended to reduce the tendency towards over-abstraction.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 79
7
Pravda, 13 January 1988; Gregory Gleason, Federalism and Nationalism: The Struggle for
RepublicanRights in the USSR (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1990), pp. 5-6, 108, 130.
8
Gustafson, Reform in Soviet Politics, p. x.
9 Masculine pronouns are used throughout this article when referringto a hypothetical reforming
leader; this is done solely for the sake of economy of expression.
80 TOMPSON
'0 Alfred Stepan, 'State Power in the Southern Cone of Latin America', in Peter B. Evans
et al., eds, Bringing the State Back In (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp. 319-20ff.
" Whitefield, Soviet IndustrialMinistries, p. 17.
12
Popov, 'Dva tsveta vremeni', pp. 16-17.
13
This is a simplification of William Riker's scheme of side payments; see The Theoryof Political
Coalitions (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1962), pp. 109-13.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 81
the territorial party apparatus, and the opening up of politics threatened the
party-state elite's monopoly of political power.14
shift as the issues at the top of the political agenda change and as the results
of past reforms and likely outcomes of future ones become clear.18
As the reform strategy is pursued, the reformeris likely to face thefragmenta-
tion of the reform coalition and growing resistance to the reform programme.
Divisions arise between those who wish to carry reform further and those
who wish to impose narrower limits on it. Cleavages may also develop among
those sharing a commitment to further reform about the direction it should
take.'9 Ultimately, the limits to reform are discovered, either in terms of what
the reformers are able to achieve or in terms of what they are willing to attempt.
The limits of reform are to be found at the point where the gravity of the
threat posed by further reform is felt (by the leader or by other powerful actors)
to exceed that of the threat which prompted it.20 The limits of reform are
also influenced by outcomes, since the success or failure of the reformers in
'delivering the goods' in the past will affect their power and authority, and
hence their ability (not to say willingness) to go further along the path of
reform.
The analysis of the reform efforts of Khrushchev and Gorbachev in this section
follows as closely as possible the stages of the reform process outlined above.
There is, however, some overlap between stages, and the decision to address
a particular issue in connection with one stage and not another is in some
cases a matter of judgement. This is unavoidable, given that the stages in the
schema do not follow one another in a precise order but rather unfold concur-
rently. Thus it is impossible, for example, to discuss reform strategies without
some reference to coalition building.
ThreatIdentification
Nikita Khrushchev came to power at a time when there was a broad consensus
among the country's elite on the need for change. A limited amount of de-
Stalinization was quietly initiated immediately after the death of the vozhd'
in 1953.21Stalin's successors were unsure of their position and faced pressure
18 This is one of the reasons for rejecting accounts of Khrushchev's leadership like Carl Linden's,
which treat Khrushchev as an embattled reformerfighting a losing struggle against the neo-Stalinists
who surround him; matters were far more complicated than Linden's account implies. See Carl
A. Linden, Khrushchevand the Soviet Leadership, 1957-1964 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University
Press, 1966). For a critique of Linden's views, see W. J. Tompson, 'Nikita Khrushchev and the
Territorial Apparatus, 1953-1964' (doctoral thesis, University of Oxford, 1991), pp. 284-90.
'9 Richard Sakwa, Gorbachevand His Reforms, 1985-1990 (Deddington, Oxon: Philip Allan,
1990), p. 40.
20
Gustafson, Reform in Soviet Politics, p. x.
21
See, for example, L. A. Openkin, 'Na istoricheskom pereput'e', Voprosyistorii KPSS, 1 (Janu-
ary 1990) and E. Ya. Zubkova, 'Khrushchev, Malenkov i "ottepel"", Kommunist, 9 (September
1990).
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 83
for change from at least three sources. First, there was the pressure to raise
the standard of living of the population and, in particular, to improve the
situation concerning agriculture and food supply. Secondly, there were pres-
sures from within the elite for greater physical security and a greater degree
of regularity in the management of the party and state.22Finally, the regime
faced a legitimacy problem. In the course of the Stalin years, the legitimacy
of the Soviet regime had been pulled loose from its original ideological moorings
and tied ever more closely to the person of Stalin.23 Following his death,
the Soviet Union's leaders had to cast about for another legitimating principle.
Gorbachev came to power in 1985 faced with a threat which was narrower
but more acute. While the Soviet system was by this time facing a wide array
of political and social problems, the impulse for reform arose from one source
above all others: economic stagnation. Not only did deteriorating economic
performance hinder attempts to address these other issues, it also created a
legitimacy problem for the regime. By 1985 the legitimacy of the ruling CPSU
rested not upon a charismatic or personalistic basis as it had in 1953, but
on successful economic performance.24Whatever its formal claims, the defacto
linchpin of the party's legitimacy was its success as an economic manager.
As long as economic performance was reasonably good, this claim enjoyed
some credibility. By 1985, falling rates of growth and the accumulating evidence
of economic (and, consequently, social) stagnation had left it in tatters; this
economic stagnation also undermined the Soviet Union's ability to support
its foreign and defence policies.
Despite the problems faced by Soviet leaders in 1953 and 1985, it would
be a mistake to see immediate reform attempts as having been inevitable. In
neither case is there any evidence to suggest that the leadership was faced
with an imminent catastrophe if drastic action had not immediately been taken.25
Stopgap measures or increased repression were also, in the short term at least,
plausible options. Gorbachev himself has said that, in the absence of reform,
26
he could have expected to carry on in power for at least five or ten years.2
As long-term solutions, however, such half-measures were viable neither in
1953 nor in 1985. Ultimately Stalin's heirs could resist the pressures for greater
institutionalization and a de-personalization of regime legitimacy only by re-
placing Stalin, that is by re-creating a single directing centre in the person
22
Jerry F. Hough and Merle R. Fainsod, How the Soviet Union Is Governed(Cambridge, Mass.:
Harvard University Press, 1979), pp. 192-3.
23 Graeme
Gill, 'Khrushchev and Systemic Development', in Martin McCauley, ed., Khrushchev
and Khrushchevism(London: Macmillan, 1987), pp. 30-45, at p. 33.
24
Ronald Hill, 'The CPSU in the 1990s' (lecture given at St Antony's College, Oxford, 29
October 1990).
25 It would
appear, however, that the 1953 leaders harboured such fears, at least in the immediate
aftermath of Stalin's death. See Openkin, 'Na istoricheskom pereput'e', p. 109, which hints at
this. The tone of the leadership's pronouncements at the time of Stalin's death also suggested
such a fear (see Pravda, 5-7 March 1953) as did their reactions to Beria's activities. See 'Delo
Beriia', Izvestiia TsK KPSS, 1 & 2 (January and February 1991).
26
Pravda, 1 December 1990, p. 4.
84 TOMPSON
of one of their number. Committed for both personal and political reasons
to preventing such an outcome, they had little choice but to follow a new
course. In 1985, the problem was simpler:the economic mechanism was dysfunc-
tional and the prospects for achieving satisfactory growth over the long term
without reform were not good.
Reform Strategies
Khrushchev and his colleagues were in general agreement on the need to take
a number of steps in the immediate aftermath of Stalin's death. First, the security
organs were subordinated to party authority.27Henceforth, secret police terror
was not to be used as a weapon against members of the ruling elite. Secondly,
the leadership opted for a greater degree of institutional regularity in the sys-
tem's operations while administrative officials were at the same time subjected
to less pressure and interference from above.28 Even so simple a measure
as setting regular hours for the work of state administrators seems to have
had a major impact.29These measures limited the power of the central political
leadership, making interference in the work of administrative bodies 'from
on high' both less frequent and more costly. The upshot of these first two
changes was to establish the institutional hegemony of the apparat in the early
stages of de-Stalinization, one of the most important changes of the period.30
The sacrifice involved in curtailing arbitrary interference and the use of terror
against the elite was (initially, at any rate) minimal, since the indeterminate
succession ensured that no one could have exercised those prerogatives anyway
and members of the Presidium had an interest in seeing to it that none of
their colleagues gained such power. Subsequently, Khrushchev attempted to
limit the apparat's hegemony and to refashion it into an instrument of central
rule. His efforts in this direction angered the apparat without breaking its
power and contributed to his downfall in 1964.31
A third step taken after Stalin's death was the new leaders' emphasis on
greater collegiality of leadership at all levels. Among the top elites, the stress
on collective leadership was largely a product of the inconclusive struggle to
27 Anecdotal evidence
suggests that this enhanced the authority of local as well as central party
leaders over the KGB (A. Karaulov, Vokrug Kremlya.-kniga politicheskikh dialogov (Moscow:
Novosti, 1990), p. 32).
28
George Breslauer, Khrushchevand Brezhnev as Leaders: Building Authority in Soviet Politics
(London: George Allen & Unwin, 1982), p. 40. See also Popov, 'Dva tsveta vremeni', pp. 15,
17.
29 Stalin's nocturnal habits meant that state and party administrators often had to work extraordi-
narily long, late and irregular hours; failure to be in one's office when needed could be dangerous.
As a result, the decree on working hours both improved administrators' quality of life and eased
the pressure on them (R. Medvedev, N. S. Khrushchev:politicheskaya biografiia (Moscow: Kniga,
1990), pp. 74-5; Aleksei Adzhubei, 'Krushenie nadezhd: Khrushchev, kakim ya ego pomniu'
(unpublished manuscript, 1991), pp. 139-40.
30 Azrael, 'Varieties of de-Stalinization', p. 146;Popov, 'Dva tsveta vremeni', pp. 14-17, especially
p. 14.
31
Tompson, 'Khrushchev and the Territorial Apparatus', pp. 257-60.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 85
32
Tompson, 'Khrushchev and the Territorial Apparatus', pp. 44, 67-8.
33 For a discussion of the implications of this shift in the regime's legitimation strategy for
Soviet political life, see John Miller, 'The Communist Party: Trends and Problems', in Archie
Brown and Michael Kaser, eds, Soviet Policy for the 1980s (London: Macmillan, 1982). pp. 1-34,
at pp. Iff; also Zubkova, 'Khrushchev, Malenkov i "ottepel "', p. 87.
34
George Breslauer, 'Khrushchev Reconsidered', Problems of Communism,25, no. 5 (September-
October 1976), 18-33, p. 23.
86 TOMPSON
party and of both party and non-party aktivy was increased. Efforts were made
to expand the role of social organizations such as trade unions and factory
committees. Khrushchev's own rhetoric was distinctly anti-elitist.35His strategy
included not only political pressure from above but also social and political
pressures from below; the populace was encouraged to criticise officials and
to undertake certain kinds of social initiatives on their own. These policies
were a part of the First Secretary's attack on the institutional hegemony of
the apparat after 1957. Their impact on its attitude towards Khrushchev can
be gauged from the bitter criticism directed against him on this score after
his removal, when he was accused of having fostered mass discontent with
lower party organs.36Finally, Khrushchev broke with many of his colleagues
over the desirable extent of the thaw in the arts and the mass media. He did
not, however, have consistent views on this issue himself, and his rule saw
numerous zigzags and inconsistencies in cultural policy.37
Khrushchev's reformist vision was conceived as an attempt to return 'to
an unsullied Leninism by stripping the system of the accumulated layers of
distortion and bureaucracy'.38Unlike Gorbachev's reform efforts, it was char-
acterized not so much by a sense of crisis as by a buoyant optimism concerning
the future of Soviet society. The attempts to de-bureaucratize local leadership
and to remove more and more functions from the state to social organizations
were intended not to increase pluralism but to replace administrative measures
with social control as a means of achieving social discipline and attitudinal
homogeneity.39 The threat he perceived (correctly, one might argue in hind-
sight) was stagnation and immobilism, as the apparat became less and less
responsive to political direction and increasingly capable of blocking social
and economic change.
The early post-Stalin phase of (more or less) consensual reform stands in
sharp contrast to the early Gorbachev period. The earliest Gorbachev years
were characterized by a thinner and more fragile consensus, largely because
there was little opportunity to take steps that would create large numbers of
winners and few losers. There was, to be sure, a widespread feeling that some-
thing had to be done, but there was very little agreement as to what. Political
reform was barely on the agenda40and the consensus on economic reform
was limited indeed: greater emphasis on discipline, replacement of aged cadres,
35 Breslauer, 'Khrushchev Reconsidered', p. 24.
36 'Posle
plenuma. Smeshchenie Khrushcheva: versiia dlya partaktiva', Kommunist, 4 (March
1991), p. 110.
37 Michel Tatu, Power in the Kremlin:From Khrushchev'sDecline to Collective Leadership(Lon-
don: Collins, 1969), pp. 244-9, 298-311, 316-19; Medvedev, N. S. Khrushchev,pp. 144-8, 195-200,
245-62.
38 Sakwa, Gorbachevand His Reforms, p. 29.
39 Breslauer, Khrushchevand Brezhnev,p. 76.
40 Gorbachev in fact began pressing for political reform in 1985, but little headway was made
until the January 1987 CC plenum. The fact that this plenum met only after three postponements
attests to the strength of the opposition to this line of reform. See John Gooding, 'Gorbachev
and Democracy', Soviet Studies, 42 (1990), 195-231, p. 206.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 87
a tightening of central control over the economy and the transferof an increasing
amount of the civilian economy to the jurisdiction of the defence complex.
Indeed, it is questionable whether this was much of a reform consensus at
all.
Gorbachev could hope for little success along this path. By early 1986, collaps-
ing oil prices, a weakening dollar41and an energy crisis brought on in part
by Chernobyl' were giving renewed urgency to the drive for economic reform.
Perestroika was thus prompted principally by the Soviet Union's poor economic
performance, but it was not about economic reform alone. Radical economic
reform was impossible without radical political change.42In order to generate
the political support necessary to force through economic reforms to which
the apparat was generally hostile, Gorbachev pursued a mobilizational strategy
designed to combine mass pressure on the apparat from below with the pressure
which he and his allies exerted from above. His anti-corruption campaigns
and other policies designed to restore central authority and party discipline
provided much of the pressure from above, while an increasingly radical brand
of glasnost' gave rise to pressures from below. In 1987, political reform was
at last forced on the agenda and Gorbachev succeeded in 1988-90 in revitalizing
and restructuring the soviets and other organs of state power. This facilitated
his efforts to find himself a political base independent of the apparat on which
he could rely in his efforts to subdue resistance from within it. Little progress
was made on economic reform, however, and such reform measures as were
adopted (for example, the 1987 Law on State Enterprises)were often not imple-
mented as intended. Nevertheless, Gorbachev came down increasingly on the
side of enterprise autonomy and market-oriented reforms.
Political reform was more than simply a tool for overcoming resistance to
economic reform, however; it was also an end in itself. In contrast to the utopian
Khrushchev, Gorbachev rapidly abandoned the ideal of communism, without
which the arguments for the CPSU's monopoly of legitimate power were mean-
ingless.43Glasnost', by stripping the party of its claim to a monopoly of truth,
further undermined its claim to a monopoly of power. A new basis for the legiti-
macy of the regime had therefore to be found. Finally, there is good reason to
believe that Gorbachev pursued glasnost' and democratization from conviction
41 The
Group of Seven's Plaza Accord of 1985 had a devastating effect on Soviet hard currency
trade. Most Soviet exports were denominated in dollars, while imports tended to be in Deutsch-
marks; thus the fall in the dollar and the strengthening of the Deutschmark engineered by the
G7 accord greatly weakened the Soviet Union's external accounts position. See Paul Newman,
'The USSR: A Banking and Financial Perspective' (paper given at St Antony's College, Oxford,
14 May 1990).
42 Gooding, 'Gorbachev and Democracy', p. 197.
43 John Gooding has traced the disappearance of all references to communism from Gorbachev's
discourse; see, Gooding, 'Gorbachev and Democracy', pp. 200-2. The link between the communist
ideal and the CPSU's claim to power has been set out by T. H. Rigby; see T. H. Rigby, 'Conclusion:
The Gorbachev Era Launched', in R. F. Miller, J. H. Miller and T. H. Rigby, eds, Gorbachev
at the Helm: A New Era in Soviet Politics? (London: Croom Helm, 1987), pp. 235-46.
88 TOMPSON
44
Gooding, 'Gorbachev and Democracy', pp. 197, 210-11; George Breslauer, 'Gorbachev:
Diverse Perspectives', in Ed Hewett and Victor Winston, eds, Milestones in Glasnost and Peres-
troyka. Politics and People (Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution, 1991), p. 490.
45 John
Gooding, 'Perestroika as Revolution from Within: An Interpretation', Russian Review,
51 (1992), p. 51.
46 Jerry Hough, 'Gorbachev's Endgame', in Alexander Dallin and Gail Lapidus, eds, The Soviet
System in Crisis. A Reader of Westernand Soviet Views (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1991), 224-50,
at p. 235.
47 The phrase is Hough's ('Gorbachev's Endgame', p. 244).
48
Peter Reddaway, 'The Quality of Gorbachev's Leadership', in Hewett and Winston, eds,
Milestones in Glasnostand Perestroyka, pp. 431-45, at pp. 431, 434.
49
Stephen White, Gorbachevin Power (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 183.
50 Sakwa, Gorbachevand His Reforms, pp. 31-3.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 89
Coalition Building
Reformers may generally win the support of other actors by bringing on board
those interests that stand to gain from reform, by paying off (or threatening)
likely losers and by convincing other actors that there is more to fear from
existing threats to the status quo than from reform. In this respect, it may
have been to Khrushchev's advantage that he and his colleagues in 1953 faced
a wide array of pressures for change. So much was wrong in March 1953
that it was possible by means of limited changes to create far more winners
than losers. The greater assurance of physical security provided to the elite
when the use of terror against them ended was to be an important source
of compensation for those who stood to lose from other changes in the power
structure. To a certain extent, greater institutionalization curtailed some of
the powers of local party officials, who in the 'shapeless' bureaucratic environ-
ment of the late Stalin years had derived much of their power from the very
54 Charles H. Fairbanks Jr, 'National Cadres in the Soviet System: The Evidence of Beria's
Career', in Jeremy Azrael, ed., Soviet Nationality Policies and Practices (New York: Praeger,
1978), p. 181; Charles H. Fairbanks Jr, 'Soviet Bureaucratic Politics: The Role of Leaders and
Lower Officials', in Thomas F. Remington, ed., Politics and the Soviet System: Essays in Honour
of Frederick C. Barghoorn(London: Macmillan, 1989), p. 109; Seweryn Bialer, Stalin's Successors:
Leadership, Stability and Change in the Soviet Union (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1980), pp. 10, 16-17.
55 Popov, 'Dva tsveta vremeni', p. 17.
56
Tompson, 'Khrushchev and the Territorial Apparatus', chaps. 3-5.
57 N. Barsukov, 'Kak byl "nizlozhen" N. S. Khrushchev', Obshchestvennyenauki, 6 (November
1989), p. 136; Tompson, 'Khrushchev and the Territorial Apparatus', pp. 280-4.
58 Breslauer, Khrushchevand Brezhnev,pp. 35-8, 60, 78-9.
59 Popov, 'Dva tsveta vremeni', p. 14.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 91
terror (and without Stalin)' wore off.60Moreover, the strategy was dangerous,
since it involved generating mass expectations, which, if unmet, could give
substance to elite fears. In the early 1960s, mounting evidence of Khrushchev's
declining popularity with the public began to suggest precisely that: far from
being the man whose policies could satisfy mass demands without compromising
the elite's position, Khrushchev was seen as the leader whose failures were
giving rise to new threats to the regime; this view was made explicit after his
removal.6'
All of the foregoing measures concern Khrushchev's efforts to deal with
powerful actors within the regime. This, however, was only a part of his political
strategy, which also involved attempts to generate support among interests
external to the regime and to draw them into the political arena as allies of
reform. Given the weakness of Soviet society vis-a-vis the state, the benefits
to be derived from such a strategy were limited indeed, at least within the
then-existing political system. Nevertheless, Khrushchev attempted to draw
support from a number of such allies. His populist appeals generated mass
pressure on officials from below. Khrushchev's ability to do this was, however,
undermined in the early 1960s as his popularity waned. Recent Soviet sources
have stressed rising popular dissatisfaction with Khrushchev's rule in his later
years and the events at Novocherkassk in 1962, where workers' protests were
violently suppressed, are seen as epitomizing the failure of his attempts to
forge an alliance with the masses against the apparat.62
It may seem strange to discuss public opinion in connection with Khrush-
chev's power, yet there is reason to believe that his standing with the public
mattered far more than Western observers have realized. Soviet discussions
of Khrushchev's removal lay a remarkable amount of stress on his declining
popularity among ordinary citizens.63This concern with popular opinion sug-
gests that at least some segments of the elite feared mass disorder if popular
expectations were not met. It is entirely consonant with John Miller's descrip-
tion of the Soviet leaders as 'convinced and thoroughgoing Hobbesians ...
persuaded of the precariousness of social cohesion and ... appalled at the
prospect of social breakdown'.64This fear was not universal, however, and
Soviet reformers had far greater trust in the populace. Both Gorbachev and
65
Reddaway, 'The Quality of Gorbachev's Leadership', in Hewett and Winston, eds, Milestones
in Glasnost and Perestroyka, p. 432.
66 N. S.
Khrushchev, Stroitel'stvo kommunizmav SSSR i razvitie sel'skogo khozyaistva (Moscow:
Gospolitizdat, 1963), vol. I, pp. 178, 402; vol. II, pp. 94-5, 376-7, 416, 425.
67
Barsukov, 'Kak byl "nizlozhen"', p. 125.
68 'Posle plenuma',
pp. 110-11.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 93
prior to 1985 than there had been prior to 1953. Many of the most important ideas of theperestroika
period were developed by Soviet scholars and dissidents during the 'years of stagnation'. See
Starr, 'The Road to Reform', pp. 17-29; Archie Brown, 'New Thinking on the Political System',
in Archie Brown, ed., New Thinking in Soviet Politics (London: Macmillan, 1992), pp. 12-28,
at especially pp. 12-15.
75 Sakwa, Gorbachevand His Reforms, p. 50.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 95
to introduce new players into the game, which it rightly saw as diluting its
own authority. Gorbachev, helped in large part by the very severity of the
country's problems, was both more ambitious than Khrushchev in expanding
the political nation and more successful in breaking down resistance to this
expansion. The party remained dependent upon Gorbachev to the end, afraid
to confront either the nation's crisis or the other forces in the political system
without him.76The nature of both the offensive (basic reform) and defensive
(regime survival) projects of perestroika changed out of all recognition, but
at each stage the apparat's concern with the latter compelled it, however reluc-
tantly, to accept yet more radical reform. This contrasts sharply with the situa-
tion in 1964, when the Central Committee overwhelmingly supported
Khrushchev's removal in response to far less radical changes. The country
had not reached such a crisis that the apparat doubted its ability to govern,
and there were no other forces in the political system to threaten its position.
Khrushchev was thus easily expendable.
Coalition Fragmentation
Much of the foregoing has already touched upon the fragmentation of reform
coalitions and the rise of resistance to the execution of reformist measures.
Divisions also occurred amongst those committed to further change about its
direction. This section focuses on what emerged in both periods as the most
important point of contention within reformist circles concerning the direction
of reform:the conflict between economic reform and territorialdecentralization.
The dominant economic actors in the system bequeathed by Stalin to his
heirs were the industrial ministries.77They were also, therefore, the greatest
bastions of resistance to fundamental reform and any successful attempt to
alter the bases of the economic system must marshal sufficient political support
to overcome their opposition. Many political interests in the Soviet system
stood to gain from the destruction of ministerial power, but these did not
necessarily have much in common beyond anti-ministerialism. Opposition to
the ministries united two very different strands of anti-ministerial sentiment:
the economic and the political. Economic opposition to ministerial power was
chiefly concerned with enterprise autonomy, the use of economic levers and
a reduction in the role of administrative diktat in management. It was, in other
words, less a reaction to the concentration of economic authority in Moscow
than to the excessive reliance on political and administrative (as opposed to
economic) levers. The second current of opinion was concerned primarily with
the question of central control and was committed to the devolution of economic
authority to the various territorial entities which made up the Soviet federal
76
At the April 1991 Central Committee plenum, a number of party leaders both harshly criticized
Gorbachev and yet were remarkably frank in admitting that the party still needed him. See Pravda,
25 April 1991, pp. 1-2; 26 April 1991, p. 3; 27 April 1991, pp. 1-4; and 29 April 1991, p. 3.
77 Whitefield has
argued that they were the dominant political actors; see Whitefield, Soviet
IndustrialMinistries.
96 TOMPSON
78 Abraham Katz, The Politics of Economic Reform in the Soviet Union (New York: Praeger,
1972), p. 62.
79
Tatu, Power in the Kremlin, pp. 284-5. There is some evidence that Khrushchev was moving
towards acceptance of a genuinely economic reform before his fall but nothing of the sort was
adopted until after his ouster (Khrushchev, Khrushchevon Khrushchev,pp. 18-19).
80 These included the strengthening of systems of state control, the creation and subsequent
strengthening of all-union State Committees, the reorganization of the economic councils them-
selves and the creation of all-union economic councils, and the strengtheining of the Soviet State
Planning Committee. See Tompson, 'Khrushchev and the Territorial Apparatus', pp. 227-57.
81 Personnel changes in Central Asia and elsewhere were geared to restoring central authority
in areas which had been allowed under Brezhnev virtually to pass beyond the control of the
centre. A number of union-republican ministries were shifted to all-union status (Bohdan Nahaylo
and Victor Swoboda, Soviet Disunion. A History of the Nationalities Problem in the USSR (London:
Hamish Hamilton, 1990), pp. 279-80).
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 97
Unfortunately for Gorbachev, the republics were inclined neither to use their
new opportunities in the manner he had envisioned nor to limit their demands
for autonomy to what he had put on offer. Moreover, democratization meant
that Gorbachev had to cope not only with the demands of local party leaders
- who were still ultimately dependent on him for their positions - but also
with the far more radical agendas of nationalist political movements in the
republics. The rise of the nationalists, moreover, meant that even relatively
'loyal' party leaders had to increase their own demands for autonomy in order
to maintain their political credibility at home. Gorbachev thus followed a path
not unlike Khrushchev's: having turned to local leaders for support in his
assault on the ministries and other central institutions, he discovered his new
allies were more difficult to live with than his adversaries at the centre, and
in the winter of 1990-91 he found himself working with the latter in order
to re-establish central authority over the periphery.
In the early stages of reform, the economic (devolution to enterprises) and
the territorial (devolution to republics) currents did not come into open conflict;
the system was so centralized that there was plenty of room for both sorts
of measures and they were, after all, united by a common enemy: ministerial
centralism. Ultimately, however, the two strands of reform were driven by
different logics. This was especially true of the 1950s and early 1960s, when
economic reform became an unintended victim of the struggle between the
ministries and the party apparatus. The territorial apparatus was far more
powerful an anti-ministerial lobby than the rather eclectic collection of econo-
mists, planners and managers advocating economic reform - and as a result
the triumph of the territorialapproach was almost inevitable. During the Gorba-
chev years, the conflict between these two tendencies was less obvious. Despite
bitter arguments over economic policy, a consensus emerged in favour of some
degree of decentralization and market-oriented economic reform. Yet the essen-
tial tension between the two emphases remained. The nationalism of the non-
Russian republics and the localism of many provinces have given rise to barriers
between regions which are as arbitrary, artificial and economically irrational
as the links forged by the old system. Many republican governments today
are far more concerned with political autonomy than with market reforms.
Economic reform is again emerging as an unintended casualty in the struggle
of the localities for autonomy.
The experiences of both Khrushchev and Gorbachev underscore two very
important points about the nature of the unreformed Soviet polity. The first
is the enormous conservative force exerted by the central economic ministries,
with their tremendous economic and political power - both their investment
priorities and their attitudes to reform remained overwhelmingly conservative
throughout. The second is the difficulty for a central leader in managing the
only conceivable alliance that might have allowed him to attack the ministries:
an alliance with the territorial apparatus. Local officials proved to be unruly,
unreliable and demanding partners whose determination to undermine the cen-
tral ministries often placed them at cross purposes with central reformers.
98 TOMPSON
Breslauer, Khrushchevand Brezhnev,pp. 50, 55; Popov, 'Dva tsveta vremeni', p. 14.
82
83
Popov, 'Dva tsveta vremeni', p. 18.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 99
84 Breslauer, 'Evaluating Gorbachev', pp. 407-10; Tichy and Devanna, The Transformational
Leader, chap. 1.
85
See Pravda and Izvestiia, 1 December 1990, p. 4.
100 TOMPSON
and, in some form and to some extent, private ownership as well.'86 This
position was a radical departure from traditional Soviet socialism. For political
reasons, he could not have advocated a shift to capitalism anyway, so his
only option was to transform the meaning of the word socialist and thereby
to prepare for the transformation of the system.87In spite of the ambiguity
of his language, there is no reason to believe that Gorbachev's conception
of socialism was entirely devoid of content or to doubt the genuineness of
the commitments outlined above. Among those things which Gorbachev called
"'last stands" - that must be defended to the death, as in the battles for Moscow
and Stalingrad' were the preservation of the union (in toto, he implied) and
the preservation of the culture, language, land and traditions of 'even the most
numerically small people'.88It is not necessary to doubt Gorbachev's sincerity
on this latter point to note that the centre was at that time trying to play
off Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republics, Autonomous Oblasts and other
minority national formations against the titular nationalities of troublesome
union republics.
After the coup, Gorbachev reinforced this sense of his own priorities,
although it is clear that he, in contrast to his erstwhile colleagues in the govern-
ment, realized that a looser union remained the only hope for preserving any
union at all. Gorbachev's ill-advised statements in defence of socialism and
the Communist party on his return to Moscow from the Crimea were more
than tactical blunders: Gorbachev remained committed to both socialism and
the party.89Although he transformed the meaning of the former and laboured
to reform the latter, he suffered politically from his identification with both.
In the climate of opinion following the coup, the party was beyond salvation,
and socialism, for many people, was too closely identified with the party and
with the old system to permit its survival.90
What the trials and tribulations of both Khrushchev and Gorbachev seem
to point to above all else are the limits of political leaders' power over the
party-state. The authoritarian strategy adopted by those who built the regime
did indeed succeed in freeing them from such external constraints as an active
opposition, a strong civil society and public opinion. For a regime intent on
transforming society rather than reflecting it, such freedom from societal con-
straints was essential. The price of this freedom was to reduce drastically the
political leader's options for exerting his authority over the institutions of the
regime itself. Dependent upon the party and state apparats both for political
86
Pravda, 1 December 1990, p. 4; italics added.
87
Gooding, 'Gorbachev and Democracy', p. 197.
88
Pravda, 1 December 1990, p. 4.
89 Indeed,
long after the coup, Gorbachev expressed his view that Lenin's revolution might
have led to true socialism and democracy had it not been for Stalin's Thermidor;see Mikhail
S. Gorbachev, The August Coup (London: HarperCollins, 1991), p. 121.
90 Gooding, 'Perestroika as Revolution from Within', p. 53.
Khrushchevand Gorbachevas Reformers 101
support and for policy implementation, the leader was ill-situated to exert the
necessary pressure upon them. The battle for reform largely consisted of the
efforts of reformist leaders to assert their power over the apparat.
Popov has argued that a political system characterized by a single leader
directing and drawing his power from such an apparat will see either the arbi-
trary rule of the leader or his subordination to the apparat.91On this account
Khrushchev's failure to retain power can be seen as a product of his refusal
to accept either outcome. He sought to preserve the system of administrative
socialism while rejecting both its 'personality cult' and 'bureaucratic' variants.
Khrushchev seems not to have understood this problem during the mid-1950s.
Indeed, he himself had played a key role in establishing the institutional
hegemony of the apparat. After 1957, however, he became increasingly aware
of it. His policies towards the party during 1958-64 reflected above all else
his desire somehow to fashion the party apparat into an effective instrument
of his rule. Personnel turnover remained extraordinarily high throughout most
of this period and the political pressure on local officials exerted by Khrushchev
was often intense, especially in the agricultural sphere. In 1961, minimum
levels of turnover were enshrined in the party rules. Party-state control was
strengthened and, in 1962, the territorial party apparatus was divided into
agricultural and industrial branches in an effort to improve party guidance
of the economy and to enhance central control. This bifurcation was
Khrushchev's last major attempt to break the apparat's monopoly of power
while preserving a one-party system.92It represented his ultimate attack on
the institutional hegemony of the party machine.
Khrushchev's attempts to bring an uncooperative party apparat to heel were
by no means limited to internal reforms of the party, however. In 1958, he
took on the job of premier and set about rebuilding the central state machine
that he had himself taken the lead in dismantling. The strengthening of Gosplan,
the creation of State Committees in industry and the establishment of a host
of other organs of central management were intended to reduce Khrushchev's
reliance on the party (and, in particular, on the Secretariat) and to provide
him with additional levers for exercising his power over the apparat. In the
end, however, these efforts succeeded in alienating the republican and local
authorities who had once been the bulwark of Khrushchev's political support
without creating for him a solid alternative power base. His declining popularity
with the public and the failure of his attempted alliances with the intelligentsia
left him, in Popov's words 'one on one with the apparat'.93The apparat resisted
his attacks on its hegemony and played the key role in his removal in 1964.94
Khrushchev sought to avoid terrorizing the apparat (as Stalin had done) or
the use of executive decrees, popular referendums and other such measures
undermined the position of the revamped all-union legislative organs. These
organs, moreover, operated in an atmosphere of legal and political uncertainty.
This is not to argue, as some have done, that Gorbachev was a sham democrat
in search of dictatorial power.97 He was, however, determined to maintain
his supremacy over the legislative branch. Gorbachev did not wish to become
dependent on the Supreme Soviet any more than on the Central Committee,
and he was aware that the former as well as the latter might block his reforms.
Khrushchev had attempted in similar fashion to free himself from reliance
on the party apparatus, but ultimately had no other institution upon which
to rely. His position as Chairman of the Soviet Council of Ministers did not
provide him with a secure and independent base, since his position was also
within the gift of the party. Gorbachev went much further, attempting to forge
an entirely separate link between newly created legislative and executive organs
and Soviet society. The result was a downgrading of the party in general and
of its leading organs in particular. Yet Gorbachev's relationship with these
new forces ultimately broke down. He failed to break decisively with the party,
both because he did not wish to abandon its resources to his opponents and
because it remained important for both the possession and the exercise of
power. Once reformed, it was to be 'the vehicle for Gorbachev's domination
of the politics of a democratizing Soviet Union'.98 In the winter of 1990-91,
he turned for a time to the military and security organs as well.
The ability of the leader to exercise his power in the Soviet system depended
upon his ability to exact the obedience of the apparat. Stalin was able to domi-
nate it through his control over the security organs: when Khrushchev and
his colleagues renounced this practice, they were, in effect renouncing the most
important instrument they had for bringing the apparat to heel. Khrushchev's
attempts to impose his will on the apparat by other means ultimately cost
him his job. Brezhnev had fewer problems on this score because he defined
his policy agenda largely in terms of the apparat's interests. Indeed, the Brezhnev
years witnessed an extraordinary loss of political control over the apparat.99
With the coming to power of Gorbachev, the struggle between leader and
apparat was renewed. Like Khrushchev he sought to avoid both terror and
submission. However, his unwillingness or inability to break decisively with
the more conservative tendencies within the regime, combined with the disast-
rous failure of many of his policies, cost him the support of non-regime allies.
Finding himself, like Khrushchev, one on one with the apparat, Gorbachev
attempted to reach a new accommodation with it - a compromise, but not
97
Hough described him as 'modernizing westernizing Czar' on the model of Ataturk, Lee Kuan
Yew and other Third World autocrats (Hough, 'Understanding Gorbachev', p. 477).
98
Gooding, 'Gorbachev and Democracy', pp. 212, 217.
99 Andranik Migranyan has described this 'steering crisis' which characterized post-1953 Soviet
102
Migranyan, 'Gorbachev's Leadership', p. 155.