Word: gorbachev
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Even if Yeltsin and Gorbachev learn to work well together, they confront enormous tasks. The problems that preceded the coup -- economic decline, government deadlock, systemic decay -- are still there. At the top of the agenda is the immediate need to purge the current leadership of coup plotters, accomplices and sympathizers. It was clear last week that the country has no patience for continuing any of these men in office, yet there is a need for expertise and experience for the rebuilding that must get under way. But it is all happening faster and more roughly than many can handle...
...wake the coup left the kind of devastated power structure that followed the democratic revolutions in Eastern Europe in 1989 and 1990. Even before Gorbachev's decision to decapitate the Communist Party, local governments had taken action. Central Committee headquarters in Moscow was sealed, party activities were banned or restricted in several republics, and leading communist publications were out of business...
...Gorbachev's attempt to move from a centrally controlled to a market economy has been in motion for years but still remains in limbo. To push the economy ahead while the government is being repaired, Gorbachev last week appointed an executive panel. Its members include Russian Prime Minister Ivan Silayev; Arkadi Volsky, who has been pushing for conversion of defense plants to civilian production; and Grigori Yavlinsky, an economist best known for helping draft the so-called 500-Day Plan for radical reform...
...Gorbachev's near zero popularity stemmed from his failure to bring even a modicum of improvement to living standards. Soviet gross national product fell 10% in the first six months of this year. Prices have risen 48%, and the distribution system has broken down completely. Though the Emergency Committee did not mention it, the defense budget is rising from 26% of the budget in 1990 to 36% in 1991. More than half of all industrial production is military...
...overarching criticism of Gorbachev's economic reforms is that he destroyed the old command system without putting anything workable in its place. Most Western economists agree that before any significant assistance is provided, the Soviet Union will have to create a new economic structure. Up to now, Gorbachev has claimed that the reactionaries held him back. But they have been flushed out. Some senior officials in Washington think Gorbachev is part of the problem. "Sure, the coup plotters were obstacles to economic reform," says an Administration foreign policy expert, "but so was Gorbachev...