Introduction

The central substance of the political revolution is the attraction of democratic ideals. In Western Europe, Spain and Portugal evolved from dictatorships into liberal democracies in the 1970s. These democratic transformations showed that even over decades of uninterrupted rule, one-party fascist regimes could not muster the capacity to perpetuate themselves. The Soviet Union and Eastern Europe will lag further behind. They will continue to be plagued by systemic difficulties and will attempt, with varying degrees of success, to adapt overly centralized, bureaucratic economies to the requirements of the new age. Stability in the military balance will not be automatic but rather will require continuous energetic efforts. If the United States checkmates Soviet military power, it will heighten the importance of the economic and political dimensions of the contest, where US strengths match up well against Soviet weaknesses.