Why is glassnot considered to be bad?

[fp5858]

I've heard some people on this site criticize the glassnot reforms under Gorbachev to have led to the downfall of the Soviet Union. From what I understand glassnot opened up avenues for freedom of speech and freedom of press. Aren't these ideas central to true marxism?

[el_chavista]

It is not glassnost for itself, it is the whole neo-liberal pack with which Gorbachóv betrayed the Russian working class.

[Cyberwave]

Perestroika was the problem, not particularly glasnost. Depending on the tendency, some communists would argue that glasnost was in fact helpful, but too little, too late. While others scoff at such inherent liberalism. Both were ultimately failures, but again, glasnost wasn't the main issue of Gorbachev's policy.

[fa2991]

I've heard the line that it wasn't until Gorbachev sort of opened things up that some of the less rosy parts of the Stalin administration came to light and that it got people to go back and question the foundations of the Soviet system. I don't know if I really buy that, though.

[Cyberwave]

I've heard the line that it wasn't until Gorbachev sort of opened things up that some of the less rosy parts of the Stalin administration came to light and that it got people to go back and question the foundations of the Soviet system. I don't know if I really buy that, though.

When Gorbachev opened the archives, media attention to Stalin's supposed brutality began to slow down, as did Gorbachev's own demonization of Stalin. A large amount of journals and studies that had arisen after the archives were opened also went unnoticed or unpublished as well. Some documents that supposedly proved Stalin's status also are questionable, or contain irregularities and what were potentially forgeries.

[Svoboda]

When Gorbachev opened the archives, media attention to Stalin's supposed brutality began to slow down, as did Gorbachev's own demonization of Stalin. A large amount of journals and studies that had arisen after the archives were opened also went unnoticed or unpublished as well. Some documents that supposedly proved Stalin's status also are questionable, or contain irregularities and what were potentially forgeries.
Stalin would be condemned in the USSR as soon as Khrushchev took power, the people in the USSR already knew how much of an asshole he was, the opening of the archives just put it into greater detail.

[el_chavista]

Stalin would be condemned in the USSR as soon as Khrushchev took power, the people in the USSR already knew how much of an asshole he was, the opening of the archives just put it into greater detail.
According to Mario Sousa's text (Lies about the Soviet Union):


In 1939 there were about 2 million prisoners of whom 454 000 had committed political crimes, and the great anti-communist propagandist Conquest said that there were 9 million political criminals.

In 1950 Conquest official propaganda says there were 12 million political prisoners when the actual figure was 578 000.
This figures were lower than the American jailed population of those years. Mario Sousa is a CP of Sweden member.

[graymouser]

Openness (glasnost) in itself was not the problem. The problem was that it, along with perestroika (reform), reflected the victory of a capitalist restorationist faction within the Soviet bureaucracy who had benefited from corruption and the shadow economy. These policies were used to undermine the Soviet planned economy and popular support for it, and then to restore capitalism at tremendous human cost.

The irony is that glasnost was only implemented once restorationists had taken control under the guise of relative orthodoxy. They were literally able to use the bureaucratic inflexibility of the CPSU and the paralysis of the working class - the very things that had sustained the bureaucratic regime - to stop any serious fightback against the return of capitalism.

[Svoboda]

Question, in principle how is NEP so much different than Perestoika?

[Ghost Hound]

Question, in principle how is NEP so much different than Perestoika?

During the time of the NEP, Russia was still backwards and barely developed. Therefore, the state-capitalist policies were merely a means of more rapidly progressing [e.g. acquiring wealth] so that the foundations of socialism could be built upon. For example, the wealth from the NEP could be more equally allocated or put back into social programs [as opposed to profits].

"We are now retreating, going back, as it were; but we are doing so in order, after first retreating, to take a running start and make a bigger leap forward.


[...]

NEP Russia will become socialist Russia." (Vladimir Lenin, Speech at a Plenary Session of the Moscow Soviet. Collected Works, vol. 33).



But when Perestroika was applied, the Soviet Union was not as economically weak, or socially backwards as it was during the 1920s when the NEP was revealed. Therefore, the goals of Perestroika were inherently to restore free markets and capitalism. The planned economy of the Soviet Union had already been undermined after the death of Stalin, when reforms were made by Khrushchev and Brezhnev, so the Soviet Union was moving away from planning and towards a more capitalistic society.

[graymouser]

Ghost Hound has a lot right, although I would question the following:


The planned economy of the Soviet Union had already been undermined after the death of Stalin, when reforms were made by Khrushchev and Brezhnev, so the Soviet Union was moving away from planning and towards a more capitalistic society.
I've seen this and similar claims made before, but I don't think they're well substantiated - Khrushchev and Brezhnev were fairly incompetent, and I happen to agree with the book Socialism Betrayed by Keeran and Kenny (aligned with the CPUSA's more "traditional" wing) that argued that a significant "shadow economy" contributed to the downfall. But what actual structural changes in the production relations are you referring to here?

[Ghost Hound]

Ghost Hound has a lot right, although I would question the following:


I've seen this and similar claims made before, but I don't think they're well substantiated - Khrushchev and Brezhnev were fairly incompetent, and I happen to agree with the book Socialism Betrayed by Keeran and Kenny (aligned with the CPUSA's more "traditional" wing) that argued that a significant "shadow economy" contributed to the downfall. But what actual structural changes in the production relations are you referring to here?

Before I answer your question, I would like to say that is another excellent point; the issue of the incompetency of the leaders. Brezhnev, as we know, was especially poor in his economics [e.g. 'Brezhnev stagnation'], and if anything cared more about his cars [and probably his eyebrows] than the Soviet people. That is one of the main issues that must be worked out in a planned economy; the need for competent economists.

Centralized planning was abolished overtime after Stalin's death. During the 1960s, Soviet economists who were at this point deeply encrusted in revisionism, made reforms that were supposedly done to "perfect" centralized planning, but of course were no such thing. Enterprises began to be able to plan their production independently, which led to increased privatization, and as we know, privatization is inequality. Because these freer enterprises were able to act independently, they were likewise able to change their economics, and so the main, "central economic plan" that was produced by the state would hardly ever reach it's supposed goals. In other words, planning had been replaced [through reforms] with the inherent anarchy of capitalist production [which eventually lead to excessive bureaucracy, increase of organized crime, unemployment, and so forth]. Profits, as a form of exploitation, then became the main focus of the "planned economy," and the means of production were gradually shifted into the hands of private owners rather than public ownership.

[Wanted Man]

I don't think anyone has ever said that "Glasnost is bad because freedom is bad". Glasnost was just one part of a much bigger package. A good question is always, "freedom for whom"? In the case of Glasnost, it was a big platform for all those enchanted with the free market, but with little to no room for the opposite of that.

[Red Commissar]

One thing anti-Communists were waiting for with glasnost was the opening of the archives about certain events in the Soviet Union's history.

Though they were dismayed when they found it could not substantiate their claims of Soviet death tolls in the tens of millions. So they stopped hailing it as a step forward.