ABSTRACT
In March 1990, Mikhail Gorbachev had been General Secretary of the Community and Public Sector Union, and recognized leader of the country, for five years. Most previous literature on Gorbachev had sought to fathom his leadership strategy, explain his ascendancy within Soviet politics, or predict whether or not his reforms can succeed. Evaluating the quality of his leadership was the next logical step. Time Magazine may proclaim Gorbachev its "Man of the Decade," even as Soviet reactionaries damn his Westernization of the country and Soviet freemarketeers damn his continued commitment to "socialism." Gorbachev has clearly used the resources of his offices to delegitimize the old order—both its institutional framework and the social values it allegedly protected: social egalitarianism; social security; stable prices; guaranteed employment at the place of work; autarky; political docility; and insulation from the outside worlds political, cultural, and economic influences.
