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Political Dynamics of the Post-Communist Transition: A Comparative Perspective

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2011

Russell Bova
Russell Bova
Affiliation:
Dickinson College, Carlisle, Pennsylvania
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Abstract

This article makes a case for viewing the politics of regime transition in communist states as a subcategory of the more generic phenomenon of transition from authoritarian rule. Drawing on case studies from Latin America and Southern Europe and from the more theoretical literature on postauthoritarian transitions that those cases have generated, the article reexamines the politics of reform in the Gorbachev-era USSR. This comparative approach shows that the dynamics of the liberalization process in the USSR adhere to a model of political change previously manifested in other parts of the world. Specifically, it provides a clearer understanding of the initial vitality and subsequent disintegration of Gorbachev's centrist reform program, as well as a new perspective from which to reevaluate Gorbachev's often-criticized program of regime democratization.

Type
Liberalization and Democratization in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe
Information
World Politics , Volume 44 , Issue 1 , October 1991 , pp. 113 - 138
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1991

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References

1 Fukuyama, Francis, “The End of History?” National Interest 16 (Summer 1989), 3–18Google Scholar.

2 Students of the USSR and other communist regimes in transition have not made much use of these cases or of the literature on postauthoritarian transitions that they have spawned. Noteworthy exceptions are Remington, Thomas F., “Regime Transition in Communist Systems,” Soviet Economy 6 (April-June 1990), 160Google Scholar–90; and Breslauer, George W., “Evaluating Gorbachev as Leader,” Soviet Economy 5 (October-December 1989), 299–340Google Scholar.

3 Sartori, Giovanni, “Concept Misformation in Political Science,” American Political Science Review 64 (December 1970), 1040CrossRefGoogle Scholar–41.

4 See, for example, Bialer, Seweryn, “Gorbachev's Program of Change: Sources, Significance, Prospects,” in Bialer, Seweryn and Mandelbaum, Michael, eds., Gorbachev's Russia America's Foreign Policy (Boulder, Colo.:Westview, 1988), 256Google Scholar–58, 299. Also see Hough, Jerry, Russia and the West: Gorbachev and the Politics of Reform (New York: Simon and 1988), 209Google Scholar–12.

5 Medhurst, Kenneth, “Spain's Evolutionary Pathway from Dictatorship to Democracy,” in Pridham, Geoffrey, ed., The New Mediterranean Democracies: Regime Transition in Spain, Greece and Portugal (London:Frank Cass, 1984), 30Google Scholar.

6 Sartori (fn. 3), 1041–42.

7 For the classic exposition of the concept of totalitarianism, see Friedrich, Carl J. and Brzezinski, Zbigniew, Totalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy (Cambridge:Harvard Univer sity Press, 1956Google Scholar). For the most well known recent effort to distinguish authoritarian from totalitarian regimes, see Kirkpatrick, Jeane, “Dictatorships and Double Standards,” Commentary, November 1979, pp. 34–45Google Scholar.

8 For a more detailed critique of the concept of totalitarianism, see Perlmutter, Amos, Modem Authoritarianism (New Haven:Yale University Press, 1981), 62–75Google Scholar.

9 Grossman, Gregory, “Roots of Gorbachev's Problems: Private Income and Outlay in the Late 1970s,” in U.S. Congress, Joint Economic Committee, Gorbachev's Economic Plans (No-wmber 23, 1987), 213Google Scholar–29.

10 Frey, Frederick W., “Cross-Cultural Survey Research in Political Science,” in Holt, Robert T. and Turner, John E., eds., The Methodology of Comparative Research (New York:Free Press, 1970), 200Google Scholar.

11 The conservative reaction of late 1990 and early 1991 appears less the result of a resurgent Communist Party than a military-KGB-Gorbachev alliance. See summary of Alexander Rahr's presentation to the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies by Peggy Mc-Inerny, “Democratic Opposition at the Crossroads” (Meeting Report 8:7, Washington, D.C.).

12 Gross, Natalie, “Glasnost': Roots and Practice,” Problems of Communism 36 (November December 1987), 69Google Scholar.

13 Yasmann, Victor, “Can Glasnost' Be Reversed?” Radio Liberty Report on the USSR 3 (February 1, 1991), 28Google Scholar.

14 O'Donnell, Guillermo and Schmitter, Philippe C., Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Tentative Conclusions about Uncertain Democracies (Baltimore:Johns Hopkins Press, 1986), 10Google Scholar. The influence of the O'Donnell and Schmitter volume permeates much of the analysis contained in this paper even though only the most direct references will be footnoted as such. (Note that the reference here is the fourth volume in a series on transitions from authoritarian rule. The four were published both separately and in a combined edition. All the page references to the four volumes in this paper are from the combined edition.)

15 Przeworski, Adam, “Democracy as a Contingent Outcome of Conflicts,” in Elster, Jon and Slagstad, Rune, eds., Constitutionalism and Democracy (Cambridge:Cambridge Univer sity Press, 1988), 61–62Google Scholar.

16 Ibid., 61.

17 Przeworski, Adam, “Some Problems in the Study of the Transition to Democracy,” in O'Donnell, Guillermo, Schmitter, Philippe C., and Whitehead, Laurence, eds., Transitionsfrom Authoritarian Rule: Comparative Perspectives (Baltimore:Johns Hopkins University Press 1986), 56Google Scholar.

18 Medhurst (fn. 5), 37.

19 New York Times, February 21, 1989, p. A3.

20 On this point, see Perlmutter (fn. 8), esp. chap. 1.

21 O'Donnell and Schmitter (fn. 14), 24.

22 Mclnemy(fn. 11).

23 O'Donnell and Schmitter (fn. 14), 26.

24 Pravda, July 2, 1988, p. 12.

25 TASS, December 1, 1988. Reported in “Constitutional Amendments Approved,” Foreign Broadcast Information Service, Daily Report: Soviet Union (December 1, 1988).

26 Preston, Paul, The Triumph of Democracy in Spain (London and New York:Methuen, 1986), 101Google Scholar.

27 Przeworski (fn. 17), 51.

28 For an alternative view of communist legitimacy that was written before the Gorbachev era, see Bialer, Seweryn, Stalin's Successors (Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 1980Google Scholar), chap. 9.

29 Przeworski (fn. 17), 52.

30 O'Donnell and Schmitter (fn. 14), 58.

31 Pravda, July 21,1989, p. 1.

32 O'Donnell and Schmitter (fn. 14), 24.

33 Preston (fn. 26), 95; Medhurst (fn. 5), 34.

34 Skidmore, Thomas E., “Brazil's Slow Road to Democratization: 1974–1985,” in Stepan, Alfred, ed., Democratizing Brazil: Problems of Transition and Consolidation (New York:Oxford University Press, 1989), 10–19Google Scholar.

35 Bruneau, Thomas C., “Continuity and Change in Portuguese Politics: Ten Years after the Revolution of 25 April 1974,”Google Scholar in Pridham (fn. 5), 73.

36 Jerry Hough comes closest to this position among Western analysts. See “Gorbachev's Endgame,” World Policy Journal 7 (Fall 1990), 639–72.

37 See Pravda, November 26, 1989, pp. 1–3.

38 Martins, Luciano, “The ‘Liberalization' of Authoritarian Rule in Brazil,” in O'Donnell, Guillermo, Schmitter, Philippe, and Whitehead, Laurence, eds., Transitionsfrom Authoritarian Rule: Latin America (Baltimore:Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986), 86Google Scholar.

39 Preston (fn. 26), 96.

40 Dankwart A. Rustow notes that the hallmark of the preparatory phase of the transition to democracy is “polarization rather than pluralism.” See Rustow, “Transitions to Democracy: Toward a Dynamic Model,” Comparative Politics 2 (April 1970), 354.

41 On the Spanish case, see Preston (fn. 26), 96. On the Brazilian case, see Martins (fn. 38), 84.

42 Rustow (fn. 40), 355

43 A predominant (although not exclusive) emphasis on the structural preconditions of democracy can be found in Diamond, Larry, Linz, Juan J., and Lipset, Seymour Martin, Democracy in Developing Countries, 4 vols. (Boulder, Colo.:Lynne Rienner, 1989Google Scholar).

44 The volume by O'Donnell and Schmitter (fn. 14) is the best example.

45 See Karl, Terry Lynn, “Dilemmas of Democratization in Latin America,” Comparative Politics 23 (October 1990), 1–21CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

46 For the text of the resolution, see Pravda, July 5, 1988, p. 2.

47 For the text of the two laws, see Pravda, December 4, 1988, pp. 1–3.

48 The authority of the electoral commissions was spelled out in the “Law on Elections” and in an article in Pravda, January 24, 1989, p. 2.

49 The specific allocation of seats in the Congress for each social organization was not written into law but is to be determined in each election by the Central Electoral Commission. The CPSU and the trade unions were the largest recipients the first time around with one hundred deputies each. The smallest recipients were allocated one deputy each and included organizations such as the Ail-Union Music Society and the All-Union Society for the Struggle for Sobriety. The complete list was published in Izvestiia, December 28, 1988, p. 1.

50 Russell Bova, “Power, Efficiency, and Democratization: The Faces of Soviet Political Reform” (Unpublished paper presented at the Mid-Atlantic Slavic Conference, Carlisle, Pa., April 1, 1989).

51 Karl (fn. 45), 8–9.

52 Ibid., 8.

53 For examples of each, see ibid., 11–12. Breslauer (fn. 2), 323–24, also applies this logic to the Soviet case.

54 See Przeworski (fn. 15), 68–69.

55 Dahl, Robert, Polyarchy: Participation and Opposition (New Haven:Yale University Press, 1971Google Scholar), chap. 3.

56 Przeworski (fn. 15), 74–75.

57 For an interesting pre-Gorbachev era discussion of the institutionalization of elite privileges, see Alexander Yanov, Detente after Brezhnev (Berkeley: Institute of International Studies, 1977), 1–16. Note also the attempts of party and state officials to lay claim to state property in the course of the transition currently under way in Eastern Europe.

58 For a discussion of this point in the Latin American and Southern European contexts, see O'Donnell and Schmitter (fn. 14), 28–29.

59 For a summary of the March 1989 election results, see Dawn Mann and Julia Wishnev-sky, “Composition of Congress of People's Deputies,” Radio Liberty Report on the USSR 1 (May 5, 1989), 1–6.

60 For a summary and analysis of these results, see Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, Elections in the Baltic States and Soviet Republics (Washington, D.C., December 1990).

61 For an elaboration of this logic in a non-Soviet context, see Przeworski (fn. 15), 71–74.

62 See, for example, the interview with Mikhail Popov, one of the initiators of the proposal, in Moscow News 34 (August 27-September 3, 1989), 12.

63 Elizabeth Teaguc, “Gorbachev Advisors Meet Secretly with Opposition Leaders,” Radii Liberty Report on the USSR 2 (June 22, 1990), 1–2.

64 Dahl (fn. 55), 78.

65 Lewin, Moshe, The Gorbachev Phenomenon: A Historical Interpretation (Berkeley:University of California Press, 1988Google Scholar); Hough, Jerry F., The Soviet Leadership in Transition (Washington, D.C.:Brookings Institution, 1980Google Scholar).

66 Lindblom, Charles E., Politics and Markets (New York:Basic Books, 1977), 161Google Scholar–69.

67 O'Donnell and Schmitter (fn. 14), 20. For a more skeptical view of the role of the business community in contemporary transitions to democracy, see Fernando H. Cardoso, “Entrepreneurs and the Transition Process: The Brazilian Case,” in O'Donnell et al. (fn. 17), 137–53. Even Cardoso admits, however, that this group gave at least limited support to the transition process.

68 Yurii Prokofiev, first secretary of the Moscow party organization, is among those reported to favor this model. Sovset Computer Network, RFE-RL Daily Report 25 (February 5, 1991). Note that the Chilean reference, although frequently encountered, is a bit of an exaggeration. Not even the strongest advocates of Soviet marketization expect the kind of laissez-faire, Chicago school approach to the market that the Chilean junta attempted. In the Soviet context, therefore, advocates of a Chilean model are simply those who seek marketi-zation now while postponing democracy until some indefinite point in the future.

69 Rustow, for example, sees national unity as the single most important background condition for democracy. See Rustow (fn. 40), 350–52.

70 Share, Donald, The Maying of Spanish Democracy (New York:Praeger, 1986), 170Google Scholar–71.

71 O'Donnell and Schmitter (fn. 14), 53–56.

72 See Karl (fn. 45), 4–5.

73 Z, “To the Stalin Mausoleum,” Daedalus 169 (Winter 1990), 295–344.