The Collapse of a Single-Party System: The Disintegration of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union

Cambridge Russian, Soviet and Post-Soviet Studies

by Graeme J. Gill

In this book Graeme Gill traces the disintegration of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until the dissolution of the USSR in December 1991. The first book to follow the debates in the party over the implications of Gorbachev's reforms and how the party should respond to them, this study is also an in-depth analysis of the institutional dynamics of a party under pressure, showing how Gorbachev's reforms and the new political forces that grew up in their wake created disunity and fragmentation that ultimately led to the collapse of the most powerful single-party state in history.

270 pages, Hardcover

First published October 13, 1994