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Thursday, March 25, 2010
Gorbachev changed the world we live in
JUST a quarter of a century ago this month a new star appeared on the horizon in Russia who did more to change the face of the world we live in than anybody else since World War II.
It was, of course, Mikhail Gorbachev’s election by the Communist Party’s Central Committee as its general secretary, succeeding the last of the old guard, Konstantin Cherneko, who died on 10 March 1985.
For the free world, a breath of fresh air had arrived on the scene. After becoming general secretary, he embarked on a radical programme summarised in the catch words Glasnost (openness) and Perestroika (restructuring).
In practice this meant greater accountability, a greater toleration of dissident opinions and the introduction of free market elements in the economy. He agreed major arms limitation treaties with the US and had a number of summit meetings with President Ronald Regan and, it seems, they hit it off well.
Gorbachev accepted the collapse of communist regimes throughout Eastern Europe in 1989. A new era had arrived on the scene in the communist world. These are well documented in a recent article headed When Gorbachev Took Charge in the International Herald Tribune, by Archie Brown, emeritus professor of politics at Oxford university.
He states that Gorbachev got the top spot in Russia for three main reasons. Firstly the old timers in charge were dying off too quickly and state funerals were becoming an embarrassment. There was need for a younger and more vigorous leader and Gorbachev, at 54 and brimful of energy, filled the bill on that score.
Secondly, there was no plausible alternative candidate. The third reason given was that he was already the second secretary of the Central Committee which meant he was well in a position to take over.
Soon after he took over there was a big change in foreign policy – Andrei Gromyko, the Soviet Foreign Minister since 1957, was replaced by Eduard Shevardnadze, a man well versed in international affairs.
At the United Nations in December 1988, Gorbachev declared that the people of every country had the right to decide for themselves in what kind of system they wished to live. Joe Stalin must have somersaulted in his grave.
In 1990 Gorbachev was awarded the Noble Peace Prize which was further recognition of what he had achieved – improving the relations between the USSR and the West. That same year, Boris Yeltsin was elected to the Russian Presidency which was an embarrassment to Gorbachev who tried to establish a working relationship with him.
In August, 1991, Gorbachev survived a coup staged by conservative elements and Yeltsin emerged as the principal focus of opposition to him. Later in the year he had no choice bit to resign when the Communist Party was abolished.
On Christmas Day 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev resigned the presidency of the Soviet Union which ceased to exist that same day.
The Irish Times in its editorial headed Gorbachev’s Revolution (13 March 2010) pinpoints what he achieved as you’ll see from this extract.
"Historian Orlando Figes has compared Gorbachev to Columbus, setting out with high ideals to find one thing and achieving something better by discarding them. In other respects he was straight out of Russian history: a second Alexander Kerensky, one of the architects of Russia’s first 1917 revolution who would be swept away in its second by the uncontrolable, pent-up forces he had unleashed.
"The shaking loose of the party from its control of the state would shake Gorbachev’s own hands from the levers of power, just as the rise of nationalism would break up the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact and would make his position as president redundant, and the world a different place."
And before I conclude here is quick look back at the background of this extraordinary man.
Mikhail Gorbachev was born on 2 March 1931, in Privolye, Russia. His father was an agricultural mechanic. He went to Moscow University to study law in 1950 and while there he met and married a philosophy student, Raisa Titorenko.
They were a very attached couple and you could safely say that they were best friends as well as husband and wife. Later she accompanied Mikhail on his many trips abroad and he looked like a list soul in earnest when she died of leukaemia on 20 September 1999. They had one daughter who became a doctor.
Mikhail Gorbachev is now president of the International Foundation for Socio-Economic and Political Studies.
To end fittingly enough with a few words from the man himself, in an article in the International Herald Tribune (13 March 2010) headed Perestroika 25 years later Mikhail Gorbachev states: "If the people are to feel and act like citizens, there is only one prescription: democracy, the rule of law and an open and honest dialogue between the government and the people. What’s holding us back is fear.
"Among both the people and the authorities, there is concern that a new round of modernization might lead to instability and even chaos. In politics, fear is a bad guide; we must overcome it.
"Today, Russia has many free, independently minded people who are ready to assume responsibility and up hold democracy. But a great deal depends now on how the government acts."
Gorbachev has certainly made an impact on this world we live in and the world is all the better for that same impact.
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