Developments in Soviet Politics

This text focuses on the key institutions and policy processes in the new political system emerging after Gorbachev’s resignation and the establishment of the Commonwealth of Independent States. It highlights the problems of governability at all levels posed by the development of mass politics - especially in its ethnic and nationalist forms - and concludes by presenting contrasting views on the future of the system and how it can best be understood. The text is updated to January 1992. One of the editors, Zvi Gitelman has also written A Century of Ambivalence: The Jews of Russia and The Soviet Union From 1881 to The Present .