Ideological orientations of the highest leadership of the CPSU in 1985–1991

Kushkhov Anzor Khachimovich Postgraduate student; Faculty of History; Lomonosov Moscow State University 119234, Russia, Moscow, Leninskie gory, 1, room "B" P602F@yandex.ru

"Perestroika" in the USSR was a complex of large-scale socio-political changes that would have been impossible without appropriate ideological support. The modern scientific literature contains more studies devoted to the political process of this period ^[1-5]. There are also works devoted to the general course of the ideological transformations of "perestroika" ^[6-9]. As for certain aspects of this process, the images of reforms presented by M. S. Gorbachev ^[10-12] and A. N. Yakovlev ^[13], as well as the relationship between ideological transformations and public opinion ^{[14, 15]}, are most often studied. At the same time, the political and economic orientations in the top leadership of the CPSU, taken as a whole, have not yet been the subject of independent research. The purpose of this article is to characterize the changes in the ideological and political climate in the Politburo and the Secretariat of the CPSU and to trace its relationship with the process of "perestroika" transformations in the USSR.

In the early 1980s, Communist ideology in the USSR was still positioned as a tool for effectively assessing the surrounding social reality, and as a set of positions shared to a greater or lesser extent by the whole society (the existence of dissidents seemed to be a minor deviation from the norm). At the same time, significant changes have taken place in the life of the state and society over the past decades, which could not but affect the content of ideology. In the era of Leonid Brezhnev, there was a tendency to "pragmatize" or even "de-ideologize" ideology: the main accents in the policy and rhetoric of the authorities were now placed on ensuring economic development and a decent standard of living ^{[16, p. 35; 17, p. 52]}. The legitimacy of the Communist Party was directly linked to the success of its economic policy. In these circumstances, public ideals in politics gave way to considerations of a material and practical nature, and therefore the attitude of the party elite to ideology became more and more functional.

In addition, the concept of "developed socialism" adopted under Leonid Brezhnev was predominantly conservative in nature, as it was aimed at apologizing the existing system of social relations. This increased the manageability of Soviet society in the short term, especially in the case of economic success, but in fact deprived the communist ideology of the opportunity to be a source of further transformation (which in turn contradicted its revolutionary essence).

At the same time, social development entailed a complication of the social structure of Soviet society, which increased its ideological heterogeneity ^{[4, p. 302; 18, p. 164]}. As a result, hidden differentiation arose in the ruling elite, associated with contradictions between different "layers" of the bureaucratic system (sectoral and territorial leaders; ministers and directors; military-industrial leaders and business executives), which led to ideological differentiation. Thus, according to A.V. Shubin, on the eve of "perestroika", groups of conditional "Puritans", "conservatives" and "liberals" formed within the Soviet political elite ^{[3, pp. 130-131]}. The correlation of the lobbying influence of different "layers" of the bureaucratic system became one of the factors influencing the course of the ruling party.

In the conditions of a decline in the pace of economic development of the USSR in the early 1980s, the CPSU leadership expressed the opinion that it was necessary to reform the Soviet economy. In 1983, an article was published by Yu.V. Andropov, "The Teachings of Karl Marx and some problems of Socialist Construction in the USSR," which stated that Soviet society had not yet been fully studied. At the same time, the leadership of the CPSU carried out measures to improve the economy: the fight against corruption and campaigns to restore order and strengthen labor discipline were combined with cautious experiments on the introduction of market mechanisms. To a certain extent, these measures anticipated the first "perestroika" transformations.

The content of the ideological transformations of perestroika was partly determined by the personalities behind them. Thus, Mikhail Gorbachev was involved in the implementation of the Food Program in 1982, before heading the CPSU. The future Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, N. I. Ryzhkov, headed the Economic Department of the Central Committee of the CPSU since 1982. The direct leadership of the ideological sphere during the period of "perestroika" was carried out by three party leaders – E. K. Ligachev, A. N. Yakovlev and V. A. Medvedev.

The ideological orientations of these leaders were partly determined by their party careers. E. K. Ligachev (formerly a regional party leader) and N. I. Ryzhkov (a native of Gosplan) were supporters of a cautious, technocratic approach. On the contrary, A. N. Yakovlev and V. A. Medvedev, having a long experience of ideological work, were inclined to more radical transformations. This discrepancy between "theorists" and "practitioners" is widely represented in the memoir literature, and is recognized by both sides despite the polarity of assessments (Ryzhkov N. I. Ten years of great upheavals. Moscow: Association "Book. Education. Mercy", 1995. p. 195; Medvedev V. A. Epiphany, myth or betrayal? On the question of the ideology of perestroika. Moscow: Eurasia, 1998. p. 132; Ligachev E. K. Who betrayed the USSR. Moscow: Rodina, 2020. P. 70; Yakovlev A. N. Twilight. Moscow: Mainland, 2005. P. 493).

M. S. Gorbachev's position, as is known, changed, but in the first years of his election he actually continued the Andropov course ^{[19, p. 41]}. The "acceleration" program proposed by him at the plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU on April 23, 1985, solved purely economic problems – its key elements were to be the development of mechanical engineering and the intensification of production based on scientific and technological progress. At the same time, the party leader paid special attention to local compliance – the words that "it is necessary to increase demand from specific individuals", "it is necessary to restore proper order at every enterprise" were combined with calls to raise the awareness of workers at all levels of production (Gorbachev M. S. On the convocation of the next XXVII Congress of the CPSU and the tasks related to with its preparation and implementation. Report at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU on April 23, 1985 // Gorbachev M. S. Selected speeches and articles. M., Politizdat, 1987. Vol. 2. p. 157). In other words, administrative and mobilization methods continued to prevail in the arsenal of the CPSU leadership.

Nevertheless, it is impossible not to mention certain innovations in the report. Among these, A.V. Shubin notes the attention to the human factor and the participation of workers in management, as well as the emphasis on the scientific and technological revolution in the implementation of transformations ^{[20, p. 601]}. Gorbachev named increasing the independence of enterprises among the economic tasks, and the development of Soviet democracy among the political ones. Of course, these provisions of the report were rather declarative in nature, but their very appearance can be called a step towards recognizing the need for systemic transformations. It is no coincidence that the text of the report contained the words that will soon become the slogans of the era – "perestroika" (twice) and "stagnation" (once) (Gorbachev M. S. On the convocation of the next XXVII Congress of the CPSU and the tasks associated with its preparation and holding. Report at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU on April 23, 1985 // Gorbachev M.S. Selected speeches and articles. Vol. 2. pp. 158, 164).

As events unfolded, the leadership of the CPSU drifted towards more radical transformations. So, already at the XXVII Congress of the CPSU in February – March 1986, the acceleration program received additional content. Now it was characterized as a set of reforms that would give development to all spheres of public life: economic, political, social, ideological. The new keywords of the program were "initiative and creativity of the masses", "truly revolutionary transformations", "development of socialist democracy" (Materials of the XXVII Congress of the CPSU. Moscow: Politizdat, 1986. pp. 24, 55). For the first time, political transformations were identified as a necessary condition for economic development, although the question of their specific content remained open.

Glasnost was also proclaimed at the congress, which quickly became an independent factor in political life in the USSR. It is equally important that the Secretary General tried to combine in his speech Marxism in the Soviet interpretation and an appeal to universal human values, more typical of the Western political tradition – hence his increased attention to global issues. So, it can be assumed that the idea of political reform began to mature in the leadership of the CPSU against the background of the first failures of the "acceleration".

It should be noted that the acceleration program set de facto mutually exclusive tasks.: 1) to strengthen the centralized management of the economy; 2) to limit the interference of the center in the activities of subordinate farms; 3) to expand the independence of enterprises with the transfer to self-financing and self-sufficiency (Materials of the XXVII Congress of the CPSU, p. 33). "Acceleration" aggravated the long-overdue problem of combining planned and market mechanisms in the national economy: the measures taken by Gorbachev's leadership most often They were prescriptive in nature, and attempts to decentralize the economy since the second half of 1986 contradicted earlier transformations (for example, in May 1985 a resolution was adopted to combat unearned income, but in November 1986 the law "On Self-employment" was adopted, which became a step towards the legalization of entrepreneurship in the USSR).

This inconsistency led to the actual failure of acceleration. At the January 1987 plenum, the idea of improving the economy through political reforms was finally realized. The actual program for 1987-1989 was Mikhail Gorbachev's report "On Perestroika and the personnel Policy of the Party," in which the resolution of current problems was linked to the action of a "braking mechanism" (Gorbachev M. S. On perestroika and the personnel policy of the party. Report at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU on January 27, 1987. / Gorbachev M.S. Selected speeches and articles. Vol. 4. M., Politizdat, 1987. p. 304). The latter implied shortcomings in the functioning of political institutions and outdated attitudes, and it was proposed to overcome them through the involvement of the masses in political life. The speaker paid special attention to glasnost, which should awaken public consciousness and become a means of controlling "the actions of clumsy managers" ^{[2, p. 852]}. Naturally, in the economic sphere, transformations were proposed to be carried out through decentralization – the key words of the economic part of the report were "self-financing", "independence" and "self-financing" (Gorbachev M. S. On perestroika and personnel policy of the party. Report at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU on January 27, 1987. / Gorbachev M. S. Selected speeches and articles. Vol. 4. p. 310).

The party leader outlined his views on these issues in more detail at the June 1987 plenum, in the report "On the tasks of the party to radically restructure economic management." Mikhail Gorbachev named "equalization" and lack of competition among the main problems of the Soviet economy, and he saw the key task as ensuring the employee "the position of a true master in his workplace, in the team, and in society as a whole" (Gorbachev M. S. On the tasks of the party to radically restructure economic management. Report at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU on June 25, 1987. / Gorbachev M.S. Selected speeches and articles. Moscow, Politizdat, 1988. Vol. 5. p. 162). The Secretary General described the general direction of the reforms as "democratization of the economy" – in fact, it was about switching to market-oriented tracks, but with the preservation of a large public sector and social guarantees.

It can be said that the leadership of the CPSU has committed a mild ideological "revision." His proposed structure of the economy as a whole fit into socialist social ideals, but contradicted the Soviet interpretation of socialism. The revolutionary rhetoric used by the General Secretary made it possible to smooth over this moment, but even so, his ideas were dangerously close to restoring private property.

It is noteworthy that M. S. Gorbachev's market program did not cause any complaints in the party leadership. This is also due to the specifics of the discussions in the Politburo.: It was positioned as a union of like-minded people, within which there can be no fundamental differences. This fact to a certain extent narrowed the space for discussion, deducing from it a significant range of issues related to goal setting. Accordingly, the political leader could only broadcast his views if they echoed the views of the Secretary General. This is partly why, in the early years of perestroika, the leadership of the CPSU demonstrated complete unanimity, with the exception of certain episodes.

In 1987, the situation changed dramatically. At the beginning of the year, Boris Yeltsin criticized the interim results of perestroika, complaining about the excessive optimism of the CPSU leadership and offering to evaluate the previous composition of the Politburo (which included Mikhail Gorbachev), for which he received a strong rebuke from his comrades. For a while, the conflict was settled, but at the October 21, 1987 plenum, Yeltsin again tried to cautiously criticize his senior colleagues in the Politburo, again being obstructed. The very fact of such a speech was already a violation of party discipline, but Yeltsin also allowed himself to criticize the results of perestroika and the leadership style of the party's top officials – hints about the personality cult forming around him were especially offensive to the general secretary ^{[3, pp. 125-126]}. Therefore, it is not surprising that Yeltsin's party career ended there.

In the same year, the contradictions between the two members of the Politburo responsible for ideology, E. K. Ligachev and A. N. Yakovlev, intensified. While the former expressed concern that glasnost was playing into the hands of critics of the Soviet government ("we are celebrating the 70th anniversary of repentance - everything is portrayed as black and useless"), the latter, on the contrary, complained about the insufficiency of perestroika reforms ("an ideological breakthrough is needed") (In the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU… According to the notes of Anatoly Chernyaev, Vadim Medvedev, Georgy Shakhnazarov (1985-1991) / Comp. A. Chernyaev (director of the project), A. Weber, V. Medvedev. Moscow: Alpina Business Books, 2006. pp. 154, 156).

The peak of the disagreements in the leadership of the CPSU was the "Andreeva case." On March 13, 1988, the newspaper Sovetskaya Rossiya published a letter from Nina Andreeva, a teacher from Leningrad, under the headline "I cannot compromise my principles." The author expressed her protest against the sharply negative assessment of Stalin's activities, which was widely disseminated in literature and the press.

The peculiarity of the situation was that the article was published without the knowledge of Mikhail Gorbachev, who had left on a visit to Yugoslavia, but was approved by members of the Politburo – E. K. Ligachev, V. I. Vorotnikov, A. A. Gromyko and others. Upon the General Secretary's return to the Politburo, an exchange of views took place, which greatly surprised all participants in the discussion – Gorbachev took a categorical position on the letter, and under his pressure, the other members of the Politburo abandoned their initial assessments. Thus, supporters of more radical reforms defeated the "guardians" in the leadership of the CPSU ^{[21, p.]}.

The reply to Andreeva's letter, prepared by A. N. Yakovlev, was published in Pravda on April 5, 1988. The letter itself was described as a "manifesto of anti-perestroika forces" and an expression of a "conservative and dogmatic" position. The personality of I. V. Stalin was assessed strictly negatively, moreover, the "command and administrative system" built by him was called "anti-Leninist, anti-socialist practice" (Yakovlev A. N. Principles of Perestroika: revolutionary thinking and actions // Pravda. 1988. April 5th. [Electronic resource] URL: https://rabkrin.org/05-04-1988-printsipyi-perestroyki-revolyutsionnost-myishleniya-i-deystviy-statya / (accessed 12/14/2024)). Accordingly, socialism in the USSR was declared deformed, and a short period of NEP was proposed as a model for transformations, which should have inclined the reader to recognize the need for market reforms, but definitely did not contribute to the growth of the authority of the current top leadership, a product of the "command and administrative system."

Mikhail Gorbachev was able to successfully use the Andreeva case. As a result of the discussion, the positions of the "conservatives" in the party and society were significantly undermined, which allowed the Secretary General not to fear opposition from the party apparatus to political reform. Its outlines were outlined at the XIX conference of the CPSU on June 30, 1988: "the cornerstone of democratization is the revival of Soviets as full–blooded organs of democracy, which would be formed on the principles of a new electoral system" (Gorbachev M. S. On the implementation of decisions of the XXVII Congress of the CPSU and the tasks of deepening perestroika. Report at the XIX All-Union Conference of the CPSU on June 28, 1988. / Gorbachev M. S. Selected speeches and articles. Moscow, Politizdat, 1989. Vol. 6. p. 400). The actual implementation of this program took place with the adoption of the law "On Elections of People's Deputies of the USSR" dated December 1, 1988, the creation of the Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR and the holding of elections to it in the spring of 1989.

The creation of a government body independent of the party apparatus entailed serious challenges for the CPSU. For decades, the party's power was reinforced by its claims to the status of the vanguard of the working people – it was believed that, by virtue of objective laws of social development, it was able to fully express the interests of the population, and therefore should lead all spheres of public life. From this point of view, the one-party system and ideological control seemed to be integral features of a socialist society. Having carried out the political reform, the CPSU abandoned one of its key ideologies, which marked its place in the system of power. Moreover, as a result of the policy of "glasnost," the CPSU also accepted political pluralism (with certain reservations), which was also radically different from traditional ideas about socialism.

At the same time, the CPSU leadership did not have a clear political program. At a meeting of the Politburo on June 19, 1989, Mikhail Gorbachev spoke as follows: "We in the Central Committee, in the Politburo and in society need to consider the ideological aspects of perestroika. There were calls to return to the capitalist order, sell land, dissolve collective farms, etc. There were calls for a social democratic concept. We need an answer about what kind of socialism we want. Without ideological fixation" (In the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU ... 2006. p. 492). Gorbachev's leadership quite easily rejected the orthodox Bolshevik tradition, but at the same time did not develop any alternative concepts. In such an environment, the future of the party after the political reform looked uncertain.

Six months later, the democratic opposition was able to raise this issue before the newly formed parliament, proposing to deprive the CPSU of the status of the ruling party (fixed in Article 6 of the USSR Constitution of 1977). This topic became the object of close attention from the Politburo and was discussed at a meeting on January 22, 1990. The more conservative part of the Politburo, which included E. K. Ligachev, V. I. Vorotnikova, L. N. Zaikova, V. I. Ivashko and V. A. Kryuchkova opposed the idea of a multiparty system. At the same time, the tone of the statements differed: only E. K. Ligachev unequivocally supported the preservation of the one-party system, while the others only pointed out the negative effects of multiparty rule. N. I. Ryzhkov, A. N. Yakovlev and E. A. Shevardnadze fully supported the introduction of a multiparty system. Finally, the remaining members of the Politburo (M. S. Gorbachev, V. A. Medvedev, A. I. Lukyanov, G. V. Razumovsky) took an intermediate position (In the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU ... 2006. pp. 544-550).

The course of the discussions shows that the top leadership of the CPSU was disoriented by the political processes that were already de facto taking place without its participation. From now on, the party needed to prove to society its right to power, which was impossible to achieve without developing a comprehensive ideology. The actual abandonment of Bolshevik theory and practice deprived the CPSU of the opportunity to claim the status of an "avant-garde party" (since it meant abandoning the grounds for it), but paradoxically, conceptual problems of this kind remained outside the focus of attention during the discussion in the Politburo. At the same time, the development of a reform program that would unite most of the CPSU members was hardly possible: the spread of opinions in the Politburo was unprecedented.

The XXVIII Congress of the CPSU, held on July 2-13, 1990, was supposed to resolve the urgent problems. It should be noted that by that time several different platforms already existed in the CPSU, and therefore the leadership was actually trying to "reassemble" the party based on its programmatic statement "Towards humane, democratic socialism." The political part of the statement postulated a commitment to the previously rejected "bourgeois" values: the rule of law, civil society and separation of powers; on the contrary, nomenklatura recruitment and democratic centralism ("as it developed under the administrative and command system") were strongly rejected.

The statement also proposed a transition to a regulated market economy with recognition of various forms of ownership – in addition to state and cooperative ownership, "private labor ownership" was also recognized. In itself, this concept sounded vague, since there were no clear criteria for distinguishing labor private property from "non-labor". At the same time, even this formulation provoked criticism from E. K. Ligachev (XXVIII Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, July 2-13, 1990: Wall Report Vol. 1. Pp. 154; 355), although the expediency of the transition to a market economy was not questioned by him or anyone else from the "the "orthodox" part of the Politburo. We believe that the very appearance of such a twofold formulation, as well as the reaction to it, is a case of inertia of thinking. The denial of private property in this case was considered by the Communists not so much as an element of the desired economic structure of society, but rather as a "dogma" that should not be violated.

The congress could hardly have reanimated the CPSU as an active political force, let alone the status of the ruling party. The years 1990-1991 were a time of its further disintegration and the final separation between the party and the state (Mikhail Gorbachev himself remained the only member of the Politburo who held a high government position in the USSR government system). The last timid attempts to "revive" the party were associated with the July plenum on June 25-26, 1991, during which Gorbachev for the first time outlined the need for the CPSU to move towards social democracy, which was ambiguously perceived at the plenum ^{[22, p. 74]}. However, no one dared to oppose the General Secretary, and on August 8, 1991, the draft of the new CPSU program was published in the press ^{[23, p. 465]}. The cautious, inconsistent and belated "social democratisation" of the CPSU was interrupted by the "August coup" – after the unsuccessful performance of the Emergency Committee, the party's activities virtually ceased, the USSR authorities were paralysed, and Mikhail Gorbachev himself could hardly claim to be a political leader.

The disintegration of the CPSU, which occurred during the "perestroika", was a consequence of the systemic crisis of the party. One of the sides of this crisis was the degradation of communist ideology. The members of the top leadership of the CPSU continued to demonstrate their commitment to socialist values and orientations, but their own orientations in the economic and political spheres were quite eclectic. The prevailing understanding of socialism for decades as a fundamentally non-market system based on the nationalization of the economy and centralized planning was rejected without much objection. Even the conservative part of the CPSU leadership did not try to defend the old economic order – they were much more concerned about maintaining political and, paradoxically, ideological control over society. Reformist leaders were more willing to raise the issue of developing a new political program, but they (especially Mikhail Gorbachev) tended to expect it to appear from somewhere outside. By the end of Perestroika, the CPSU's policy statements were more like a set of good wishes borrowed from Western liberal and socialist traditions, which eventually led to the lack of demand for the CPSU as a political force on the part of society.

In general, the actions of the CPSU leadership were contradictory and inconsistent – if at earlier moments and in conditions of higher social control they could be characterized as a manifestation of tactical flexibility, then over time it became obvious that the party leaders misunderstood the postulated ideologies. The ideological split in the party's leadership, which overlapped with it, deprived it of its future. Therefore, it is not surprising that after a heated discussion at the XXVIII Congress and the re-election of the party leadership from scratch, the CPSU practically ceased to function as a political entity.