ABSTRACT
In China, substantial economic reform was begun in 1978 and has continued, with fluctuations, into the 1990s. Throughout the Mikhail Gorbachev period, members of the Soviet leadership acknowledged the need for change, but were unsure how far reform should proceed and how fast it should be implemented. Gorbachev's inability to contain political conflict contrasts sharply with that of his counterpart, as chief reformer, in China, Deng Xiaoping. This reflects the relative positions each occupied in the respective leadership structures. The patterns of leadership politics and the entry of new political actors are both linked to the differing nature of the economic reforms the Soviet and Chinese elites sought to introduce. In the USSR, the elite initially had neither a developed program of economic reform nor an explicit timetable for the introduction of various aspects. Liberalization is also crucial to economic reform because of the important role played by communications and information in a decentralized market-based system.
