ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the transformation of societies from state socialism to capitalism has to be contextualized in an internationalist perspective. It considers the role of external forces on the behavior of the political elites under Gorbachev and also in the post-socialist period under Eltsin. The chapter restricts to the economic dimension of global transformation of the countries of Eastern Europe and the former USSR. There are two main economic arguments put forward in support of the thesis that the state socialist societies were a part of the capitalist world. First, increasing levels of imports, and consequent high levels of foreign debt, created dependency on the Western capitalist system. Second, the growth of communist transnational corporations led to a direct internal dynamic. The new post-socialist member states of the EU are formally members of the 'core' of the world system; they form a bloc of subordinate elite states.
