The New Russia.

• Author: Azizian, Rouben
• Position: Book review

THE NEW RUSSIA

Author: Mikhail Gorbachev Published by: Polity Press, Cambridge and Malden, 2016, 464pp, US$35.

With Russia in the spotlight of international politics today, amidst its worst confrontation with the West since the Cold War, last Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachevs new work is very timely. It represents the summation of his thinking on the course that Russia has taken since 1991 and offers insightful analysis beyond internal politics to address wider problems in the world.

Gorbachev recounts his vision of perestroika as a process of renewing socialism. He is neither a radical liberal who repudiated socialist ideals nor an unregenerate communist who has learned nothing during the years of perestroika. The former Soviet president articulates his loyalty to Lenin and asserts that Lenin's role in social transformation, 'his pragmatism and flexibility', have not been fully appreciated. Those who accuse Gorbachev to this day of not implementing the reform of the economic system in parallel with the political transformation do not realise that resistance by conservative forces in the government and economic bureaucracy was too great and required political liberalisation. The author acknowledges, however, that in hindsight the pace of his reform was too fast for a society in which 'radicalism exists side-by-side with traditions of conservative thinking and communal culture, of pinning hopes on a "good tsar", and limited ability to organize things independently. This comment seems very relevant today as some in the West struggle to understand Vladimir Putin's unflagging domestic popularity.

Gorbachev gets emotional and somewhat inconsistent when referring to Boris Yeltsin and the break-up of the Soviet Union, which is also perceived by him as primarily Yeltsins fault. It is the 'undemocratic' nature of Yeltsin's actions that is responsible, in Gorbachev's opinion, for failures and problems that persist to this day, such as social polarisation, corruption and dominance of the bureaucracy. That seems to be excessive in terms of attributing these long-time Russian social ills to one leaders rule.

Not surprisingly, therefore, Gorbachev views the main cause of the Ukrainian crisis as the disruption of perestroika and the 'mindless, reckless disbanding of the USSR', for which the primary responsibility lies with Russia's then leadership, namely Yeltsin, who exacerbated centrifugal processes in the union. The assessment of the Ukrainian events...