ABSTRACT
When Mikhail Gorbachev became General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in March 1985 he recognised the need for fundamental economic reform. His policy of perestrojka (economic restructuring) had very little impact, but his other famous introduction, glasnost;, an element of freedom of speech and political freedom, ultimately led to the collapse of the USSR. Reformist politicians were successful in the elections of 1989, revolutions took place in the Soviet Union’s East European satellites during 1989-90, and the republics of the Soviet Union also started to demand independence. The final blow was the unsuccessful coup by conservative elements in August 1991, which eroded Gorbachev’s position and brought Boris Yeltsin, President of Russia, to the fore. The Soviet Union was finally dissolved in December 1991. The collapse of the Soviet Union was also the birth of a new Russia. Since then Russia’s history has not been smooth, characterised by such notable events as Yeltsin’s violent clash with parliament in October 1993, ending in the siege of the Russian ‘White House’, and the financial collapse of September 1998. Despite its problems, Russia is a country with a rich culture, huge resources, both human and physical, and its capital Moscow is now a vibrant and exciting city.
