ABSTRACT
Reform movements in communist states follow a characteristic path from meliorism toward radicalism unless they are interrupted along the way. The reformists have confronted more than the very powerful political opposition of branch agencies which have successfully watered down the reform measures that have been adopted and defeated their implementation. Mikhail Gorbachev’s early pronouncements on the economy suggested a progressive broadening of the scope of his demands together with continuity of the theme of the need for a sharp increase in the rate of output growth through a program of much faster reconstruction and retooling of the country’s industrial plant. In the Soviet economy virtually all goods that are needed are in short supply; at the same time vast quantities of both producer and consumer goods are produced that are not needed, either because of appallingly low quality or an oversaturated market.
