Was the Soviet state weaker in 1985 than it had been in 1964?

Word Count: 2,148. Enrique Requero

Gorbachev concluded his years in power on 26 December 1991 with the disestablishment of the Soviet Union. Both in the USSR and abroad, the end of the union was perceived more as a collapse rather than as the product of a plannified process. Gorbachev has ever since been blamed for the end of the USSR, with his reformist policies which, even if the collapse was unavoidable, many believed at least accelerated it. The commencement of Gorbachev's rule in 1985 is thus thought of as the beginning of the end of the USSR. This essay will assess whether a progressive weakening of the state took place during the decades prior Gorbachev's period, in order to determine whether the collapse of the USSR could be all imputed to Gorbachev or it should rather be seen as the ultimate outcome of a long process. In order to do this, the essay will compare how, by 1964, the Khrushchev years had affected the overall strength of the state, as opposed to how the situation was after the administrations of Brezhnev, Andropov and Chernenko in 1985. Due to the specific nature of the Soviet Union, assessing the extent to which the state was strong of weak at any specific moment is not an easy task. The USSR comprised a territory of more than 8.5 million square-miles and had around 290 million inhabitants. Thus, while the Soviet state could have a strong presence and control of peoples lives in urban centres, it is not difficult to see how its presence could have been more diluted in remoter regions. Another factor to be taken into account is that, due to the tremendous size of the union, an enormous bureaucratic structure was needed for its administration. The Soviet bureaucratic system was divided and subdivided in hundreds of different administrative bodies and departments and, while some of them may have been very strong at a given time, some others could have simultaneously been quite weak. The KGB's quest against corruption during Andropov's rule, for example, could have given the impression that the state at the time was very strong. Nevertheless, during that same period, the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) was not reliable enough to collaborate with the KGB in fighting corruption due to the widespread practice of bribery and fraud among its officials and, thus, could have transmitted an image of state weakness.1 It is worth addressing the question of nationalism in the USSR at least briefly because it is an important issue to look at when assessing the overall strength of the Soviet state. Tishkov's analysis of nationalism before and after Perestroika illustrate how the development of nationalist tendencies in many of the 15 Soviet republics since as early as 1953 could have signified different degrees of state strength in each of the republics.2 Moreover, Breslauer's study of the nature of

1 Duhamel (2000), p.1308. 2 Tishkov (1991).

Was the Soviet state weaker in 1985 than it had been in 1964?

Enrique Requero

centre-periphery relations within party structures, show how articulations of demands by regional party leaders increased over the decades since Stalin's death and that in some cases these could have undermined the strength of central powers in favour of regional ones. 3 This study shows how while the state structures could be weak or strong at a union-wide level, the complete opposite could well be going on simultaneously at a regional level. David Lane makes a final point which is important to bear in mind when comparing the policies from different periods of Soviet history. Although it is true that General Secretaries did directly influence the policies made during their time in power and that in many cases these policies reflected the personal charisma of the ruler behind them, there is the danger for Western observers of exaggerating this and assuming that a change of leader implied a radical change in the Soviet state (and its strength) as a whole. Despite some degree of division and competition among soviet leaders, on the whole in Soviet history one can see that Politburo members agreed on the fundamentals and that Soviet policy had greater consistency and durability than in Western democracies.4 Examples of this are the continuation during Brezhnev's rule of a series of trends of political liberalisation and social industrialisation started by Khrushchev (despite Brezhnevs alleged 'neotraditionalism'),5 or the lack of major change in policy with the transition from Andropov to Chernenko (the latter being the main political opponent of the former). 6 Even though this essay will argue that there was a significant drift in the strength of the state from 1964 to 1985 and that both Khrushchev and Brezhnev had a lot to do with it, Lane's point should be insisted on; there was continuity throughout the period and the gradual weakening of the state was part of a single process. Having made these initial clarifications, the essay will move on now to assess the overall strength of the Soviet state that resulted from Khrushchev's rule, compared to the overall weakness which the state suffered in 1985 mainly as a result of Brezhnev's policies. Nikita Khrushchev's most famous contribution to the Soviet Union was setting in motion the so-called process of 'destalinization'. This process was portrayed as a reversal of Stalinist terror techniques and a return to Marxist-Leninist principles. Moreover, in the 20th Party Congress of 1959, Khrushchev also expressed the Soviet leadership's new commitment to start a series of reforms which would contribute to reach the state of communism within a generation. 7 A chain of ideologically-driven campaigns followed, seeking among other things the 'withering away of the

3 Breslauer (1986). 4 Lane (1985), p.128. 5 Jowitt (1983). 6 Lane, p.125. 7 Gorlizki (1998), p.403.

Was the Soviet state weaker in 1985 than it had been in 1964?

Enrique Requero

state' as a necessary step in the transition towards communism.8 This 'withering away of the state' implied a movement of democratisation which would result in the end of the 'dictatorship of the proletariat' and the beginning of an 'All People's State' in which the organs of state power were to become organs of public self-government.9 A materialisation of this principle was the reintroduction of the historical Comrades' Courts in 1959. These Courts were a sort of neighbourhood associations which were given jurisdiction over petty crime and acts of anti-social behaviour and which inflicted punishment by means of measures of social pressure.10 Although there was a fear that this delegation of juridical powers on the people would weaken the position of the state, soviet officials such as Rudenko were certain that the transfer of certain functions from the state agencies to social organisations by no means signifies weakening the role of the socialist state in the construction of communism.11 Comrades' Courts and other social organisations which received devolved powers from the governmental agencies did not weaken the position of the state because they did not effectively 'wither' the state at all but rather integrated people more in it. Thus, it could be said that in the Khrushchevian 'All People's State', the state was stronger because by furthering the integration of the collective into the soviet institutions, state and ideology were made more present in everyday life. Some of Khrushchev's reforms could have weakened the position of the state, not because they 'withered' but because of inefficiencies or opposition encountered in their implementation. An example of this was the wage reform introduced as a sine qua non step to reform industry and to make it more efficient. Not only did the reform fail to attain its main goal, which was to introduce a coherent, predictable and centrally controlled system of incentives;12 but it also forced industrial managers to rely even more on wage anomalies to maintain their workers and contributed to create a general sense of chaos and discontent with the state. Discontent over decrease of wages and increase of norms was such that when an increase of meat and dairy prices was announced in June 1962, workers in Novocherkassk marched on the streets to protest.13 The subsequent massacre of 24 protesters and its concealment by the authorities showed that regardless of the rhetoric of democratisation, the state under Khrushchev was still strong, totalitarian and ready to inflict fear. This somehow also reflected the temperamental character of Khrushchev himself, who when an idea entered his head he hurried to put it into operation without thought and without discussion with others.14 Khrushchev's violation of the principle of collective leadership eventually prompted his

8 Hough (1980). 9 Ibid. 10 Gorlizki, p.407. 11 Quoted in ibid., p.416. 12 Filtzer (1989), p.89. 13 http://www.soviethistory.org/index.php?page=subject&SubjectID=1961novocherkassk&Year=1961 14 Quoted in Lane, p.120.

Was the Soviet state weaker in 1985 than it had been in 1964?

Enrique Requero

ousting by agreement in the Central Committee.15 The fact that Khrushchev was removed from power without use of violence though suggests that some underlying changes were taking place in the USSR. The political leadership felt safer to impose some constitutional restraints on the leader and even to challenge his position if he failed to respect these restraints.16 Furthermore, popular responses to the Siniavskii-Daniel' conviction in 1966 also reflected that although people still trusted the Soviet state, some demands for more freedom and democracy were emerging, and more conceptualised criticisms risked challenging the legitimacy of the state if governed in undemocratic ways.17 Leonid Brezhnev's advent to power after Khrushchev's dismissal has been described by Western observers as a 'Return to Normalcy'.18 Brezhnev's 'neotraditionalism', as termed by Jowitt, accounted for his reversal of some of Khrushchev's organizational innovations, such as the fragmentation of party and government structures on a regional basis or his diversion of funding from defence to consumer industry.19 Moreover, there was the view in the West that the USSR was immersed in a state of 'stagnation', due to the lack of reforms to transform Soviet politics from being 'politically determined' to more 'system structured',20 and thus the Brezhnev period was thought of as an overall drawback to more Stalinist tendencies. This was indeed the first impression which the more militaristic Brezhnev regime transmitted. Nonetheless, change was taking place under the surface. Firstly, at least on the initial years the USSR was not ruled by a single leader but by the Brezhnev-Kosygin-Podgorny triumvirate.21 Secondly, it was already been mentioned how some of Khrushchev's liberal trends in income distribution, individual freedoms, social policies and politics were continued. 22 Thirdly, there was an ideological swerve of the regime's rhetoric towards 'Developed Socialism', encouraging more political participation and rigour in policy implementation thanks to the 'scientific-technical revolution', which enabled more involvement of technocrats in policy formulation.23 Finally and most important of all, Brezhnev's 'Little Deal'24 or his reliance on 'informal structures'25 were a way of dealing with the setbacks of the system without implementing major reforms, but which eventually prompted a sharp weakening of the state. Through the Little Deal, the state under Brezhnev allowed some degree of petty private
15 Ibid. 16 Lane, pp.20-1. 17 Kozlov (2006), pp.582-7. 18 Hough, p.252. 19 Ibid., idem Lane. 20 Lane, p.123. 21 Ibid., p.121. 22 Hough, p.266. 23 Lane, p.122, Hough, p.255. 24 Millar (1985). 25 Clark (1993).

Was the Soviet state weaker in 1985 than it had been in 1964?

Enrique Requero

activity to take place. This led to the development of the famous 'coloured markets'26 in which the line dividing legal from illegal activity was blurred and consequently the position of the state was weakened because there was more permissiveness with breaches of the law. Thus, Brezhnev's regime relied more on 'informal structures' (of dubious legality) because functional transgressions of the law allowed for people to access services and goods which the limitations of the system would not allow otherwise and all without the need of introducing unpopular reforms. Nevertheless, what the 'Little Deal' eventually led to was an erosion of the principle of social collectivity in favour of private interest, with subsequent widespread corruption in society even to top official rankings.27 Although the state may have looked strong on the surface, the high levels of corruption truly weakened its authority and its economic performance. Andropov tried to extirpate corruption after Brezhnev's death in 1982, however, he soon realised that it was too widespread and, moreover, his repressive policies to combat it had dysfunctional effects on the law enforcement agencies.28 By the time Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in 1985, not only was the Soviet Union in tremendous need of major reforms, but also the strength of the state had been severely weakened if compared to what the situation was in 1964. This had happened because under Brezhnev a major separation of state and society had taken place. Firstly, as Bahry has described, by the time Perestroika was implemented, significant liberal tendencies had developed within the younger generations and this made it impossible for the economic reforms of Perestroika to be implemented without the political openness of Glasnost.29 The Soviet people were less prepared to give their support to the state without retribution. Secondly, the dramatic increase and spreading of corruption showed how society had effectively withdrawn its support for the state, because people no longer believed in the socialist cause, and if even if they still did, private interest came first now. This is where the weakness of the state in 1985 lay, in the fact that it no longer had support from the people. Solnick argues that a deeper understanding of the collapse of the USSR would be gained if apart from looking at ideological decay, elite politics and societal interests; one focused on the 'microinstitutional' approach and thus realised that the hierarchical breakdown and weakening of the state resulted 'not from a sudden relaxation of comprehensive controls but rather from incremental increase in the already wide discretion enjoyed by street-level actors'.30

26 Katsenelinboigen (1977). 27 Millar, p.703, Duhamel (2000), p.1309. 28 Duhamel, p.1326. 29 Bahry (1993), Mau (1995), p.397. 30 Solnick (1998), pp.14-24.

Was the Soviet state weaker in 1985 than it had been in 1964?

Enrique Requero

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