Ideological Transformation under Gorbachev: The Extra-systemic Phase, 1990–91

Abstract

The last 18 months of the Soviet Union were a period of extraordinarily rapid and extensive disintegration – political, economic, ideological. These unravelling processes were especially evident in the area of labour ideology which, for over 70 years, had supplied the Soviet state with its dominant ethos. While certain fundamental principles continued to influence policy, the reactive tendencies identified in the previous chapter became ever more pronounced in the climate of desperation that characterized the regime’s dying days. Like so many other areas of official thinking, labour ideology underwent constant (and often substantial) modification and dilution in response to rapidly unfolding developments and the changing realities of power. Indeed, so unstable and inconsistent were the regime’s attitudes towards labour during this period, that it is no longer appropriate to talk about an ‘official’ labour ideology as such, but rather about the existence of two opposing trends – the ‘disembodiment’ of labour ideology, and the ‘politicization’ of labour issues.