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4 - Blindman's Bluff

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

Steven Rosefielde  and
Stefan Hedlund
Steven Rosefielde
Affiliation:
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Stefan Hedlund
Affiliation:
Uppsala Universitet, Sweden
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Summary

Wishful Thinking

As memories of Sovietology fade, many scholars prefer to forget that they misappraised the motives of those pressing for Soviet regime change and portrayed the Gorbachev years as a time of high hopes. Socialists who kept the faith continued to believe that the future was theirs, that the USSR would eventually realize its ideals. Western optimists of various persuasions likewise were encouraged by Gorbachev's post-1986 democratic and humanistic rhetoric, tiptoe marketization, and most of all by gestures of rapprochement. Although, they grasped many of the Soviet Union's economic shortcomings, most preferred not to consider the possibility that warmer relations might be a subterfuge or sabotaged by stagnation, depression, or collapse. The glasnost (openness) years for them were perceived in accordance with western harmonist public culture as the dawning of a new enlightened age of westernization, arms control, disarmament, peace, and global prosperity. Privateers and catastroika were invisible on their radar screens (see appendix), and even today, the myth of Ronald Reagan's and Gorbachev's epochal, cold war–ending statesmanship distorts reality and overshadows the real drama.

The period of heady optimism began abruptly in 1987 with Gorbachev's declaration of novoe myslenie (new thinking), symbolizing his desire to bury the hatchet with Europe and America on a host of ideological, security, trade, investment, political, and human rights issues. Before 1987, western specialists fretted that uskorenie (GDP growth acceleration) would modernize Soviet weapons technology, intensifying the arms race or that such fears would preclude the Kremlin from gaining the financial assistance it needed to westernize.

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Russia Since 1980 , pp. 56 - 77
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2008

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  • Blindman's Bluff
  • Steven Rosefielde, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Stefan Hedlund, Uppsala Universitet, Sweden
  • Book: Russia Since 1980
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511814846.007
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Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Blindman's Bluff
  • Steven Rosefielde, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Stefan Hedlund, Uppsala Universitet, Sweden
  • Book: Russia Since 1980
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511814846.007
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Blindman's Bluff
  • Steven Rosefielde, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Stefan Hedlund, Uppsala Universitet, Sweden
  • Book: Russia Since 1980
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511814846.007
Available formats
×