Did Gorbachev Succeed in De-ideologising Soviet Foreign Policy - Essay Example

?What did Gorbachev mean by the ‘new political thinking’ in foreign policy? Was it compatible with Marxism-Leninism? Did Gorbachev succeed in ‘de-ideologising’ Soviet foreign policy? Introduction The new political thinking initiated by the Gorbachev regime in the former Soviet Union brought in tremendous changes in the foreign policy of the country. Perestroika was considered as the opening of the Russia to world and in turn the world to the Russia. Gorbachev’s new foreign policy was characterised by the ‘free will’ to put an end to arms race, which was materialised as the freezing of nuclear tests in august 1985, the general disarmament plan in January 1986, agreement on the elimination of medium range nuclear missiles in 1987, large scale military cuts and pulling out from Afghanistan in 1989. However, Gorbachev miserably failed not only in democratising the regime but also in preserving it. The compatibility of Gorbachev’s policies with Marxism could only be determined with relations to what we consider as the central tenets of Marxism. Still, along the Gramscian lines, it is possible to argue that the Soviet Russia undergone a phase of passive revolutions under the (non)leadership of Gorbachev. From a Marxist perspective, the Soviet Foreign policy had de-ideologised by the 1960s itself. The Gorbachevian reforms at the realm of foreign policy tried to get the foreign policy out of the irrational fears of cold war era. Gorbachevian Reforms and the New Political Thinking Many people think that the structural reforms undertook by Gorbachev was a response to the growing economic crisis Soviet Union faced in the 1980s. However, such a viewpoint does not consider the fact that many countries that are substantially poorer than Soviet Union have not undergone any systemic changes. Certainly, Gorbachev tried to modernise the economy and introduced new management techniques which are capitalistic in essence to unfetter production. However, perestroika needs to be understood as more about political reforms than economic reforms. Ironically, Gorbachevian reforms have many similarities with the austerity programmes usually adopted in capitalist countries. Gorbachev’s new political thinking was basically defined in terms of the need for an integrated world wherein both the Soviet Union and the West must try for the de-militarisation of the planet. Tsygankov argues that “by aiming for the West’s support and recognition, it inserted itself into the arena of the Western modernity of nation-states, making it increasingly difficult to discourage the Soviet ethnic republics from embarking on nationalist projects” (2006, p. 47). Here, the point is that the ideals of new political thinking such as world integration, enhanced cooperation with the West, greater autonomy for the ethnic nationalities were not compatible with the reality of an aggressively imperialist-capitalist West, especially under conservatives such as Regan and Thatcher. Remarkably, Gorbachev as a Soviet leader “found his main base of support not in the party, military, or industry, but in the liberal intelligentsia” (English, 2000, p.195). As an ambitious leader, Gorbachev actively sought Russia’s broad shift towards the West in general and the Europe in particular. The goal of perestroika was “to modify the relations of production and prevent social upheaval” but it ended up in “opening the door to the influence of capitalism, fragmenting the heterogeneous Soviet elite, and enabled an opposition linked to global neoliberalism to emerge which utilised the nascent Russian state as a mechanism for advancing systemic transformation” (Simon, 2010, p. 431). In brief, Gorbachev’s so-called reform policies necessarily ended up in the consolidation of the Russian ruling elites and the transfer of state powers to itself. Importantly, Gorbachev did not have a concrete policy of either economic regeneration or political transformation. Kenez is of the view that “Gorbachev believed in the possibility of reforming communism in the Soviet Union and in Eastern Europe. He did not appreciate how little legitimacy these regimes possessed, and overestimated their independent strength” (2006, p. 261). Gorbachev era thus marked the complete retreat from socialist ideals and goals both in the realm of soviet politics and economy. Perestroika and Glasnost vs. Marxism-Leninism The central tenet of the new political thinking was the recognition of the need for world integration and enhanced cooperation with the West. It goes against Marxism-Leninism as its central tenet is the inherently conflictul nature of the relationship between the socialist, anti-imperialist Soviet bloc and capitalist and imperialist West. In other words, Gorbachev’ new political thinking did not heed the basic Marxist-Leninist assertion that only mutual coexistence, not cooperation between the contending forces of capitalism and socialism. Western arms race has its capitalist logic, which is detached from the existence of the socialist bloc. Importantly, even the end of cold war did not put an end to the NATO. For any analysis of the Gorbachevian reforms, it is necessary to characterise the social formation in Soviet Union correctly. Certainly, “the Soviet Union was fundamentally a non-capitalist system in which the ruling elite, the appropriators of the surplus product, was a heterogeneous social stratum, not a class. This stratum (the so-called nomenklatura) received rewards, often in kind (access to better housing, foreign travel, etc.), allocated according to ‘rank’. These perks could not be translated, however, into private property and, prior to perestroika, the Soviet ruling elite was never able to accumulate money as capital” (Simon, 2010, p. 434). It is through the perestroika, the soviet elites overcame the hurdles laid by the remnants of socialism on private accumulation of capital and labour surplus. From a Gramscian perspective, it is possible to argue that Gorbachev’s reform policies were the culmination of a kind of passive revolution imitated by the liberal elements of the Soviet social formation that represented the emerging capitalist class in the Soviet Union. Simon is of the view that “the disintegration of the Soviet Union and Russia’s subsequent evolution can be understood as a form of passive revolution , a conceptual framework developed by the Italian Marxist, Anonio Gramsci” (2010, p. 430). It certainly helps to see things beyond the standard debates that take positions between failed democratisation and evolutionary democracy. Most of the literature on the Soviet liberalisation policies assumes that “Russia would ultimately move from liberalisation during perestroika, through a transition to democracy under Yeltsin, to eventual consolidation of a liberal democratic polity” (Simon, 2010, p. 429). The emergence of such a new liberal elite, composed of the same elites from the old regime, as result of Gorbachev’s new political thinking is merely a capitalist takeover of political rule after the gradual achievement of hegemony. Marxism-Leninism is particular in creating strong state institutions which are impersonal as party is the major force in political rule in the Marxist –Leninist regimes. It is argued that “Gorbachev had assumed various important-sounding titles and thereby aroused concern among those who feared he was becoming a dictator, but in reality the country was suffering not from too much power in the hands of one man, but from the absence of all authority and the collapse of institutions” (Kenez, 2006, p. 265). The collapse of Soviet state institutions clearly shows Gorbachev’s complete detachment from the Marxist-Leninist principles. The very existence of “post-Soviet nostalgia,” which is a complex post-Soviet construct, is the longing for the very real humane values, ethics, friendships, and creative possibilities that the reality of socialism afforded” (Yurchak, 2005, p. 8) shows that people actually believed and practiced socialist ideals, which was brushed aside by a single stroke of Gorbachev’s new political thinking. De-ideologising Soviet Foreign Policy It is important to note that Russia’s foreign policy is characterised by both change and continuity. Russia’s national interests were always defined in terms of its relations with the West. However, many people in Russia have also sought the westernisation of Russia. The primary tensions in Russian foreign policy are derived from this tension between the needs to Westernise Russia and to define its national interest vis-a-vis the West. Gorbachev’s forign policy was exactly marked by the balance between the forces of westernisation (Westernisers) and the forces of Russian national interests (nationalists) that are against the West. However, it is important to realise that both forces are equally but differently ideological. Westernisers are motivated by the belief that the West provides the model of development which Russia must follow for its own good. On the other hand, the nationalists believe that Russia’s national interests are not compatible with the West and therefore Russia must formulate a distinct foreign policy which is independent from the influence of the West. The shift in the Soviet foreign policy was not from communist to capitalist but from an opportunistic to pragmatic standpoint. However, it is argued that the “changes made in foreign policy did, however, entail a major shift in ideology, con­stituting a vital component of passive revolution and laying the foundations for further, more radical domestic change. The failure of ‘acceleration’ to achieve even a modest improvement, combined with resistance from entrenched interests, contrasted with apparent successes in international relations and prompted Gorbachev to advance the more radical perestroika (‘restructuring’)” (Simon, 2010, p. 437). The Soviet foreign policy was de-ideologised only to the extent of a unilateral withdrawal from the arms race and militarization policies. Certainly, the reforms cast aside the Soviet foreign policy myth that Soviet Union is an anti-imperialist state and at the side of the Third World countries. The fact was that Soviet Union itself had pursed imperialistic goals through its foreign policy, especially while dealing with internal conflicts in many Third World countries. It is noted that “perestroika critical discourse which exposed many unknown facts about the Soviet past and critically articulated many realities that had been implicitly known but unarticulated until then” (Yurchak, 2005, p. 7). The changes in the Soviet foreign policy were more a response to its internal problems than any genuine attempt to overcome the ideological underpinnings. Primarily, Gorbachev recognised the growing interdependency among the world’s nations and therefore he sought a definite shift from the Brezhnev’s Doctrine through his ambitious new political thinking. It tried to break away from the long entrenched Russian tendencies of authoritarianism and isolationism and “the forces of Westernization and of liberalization appeared to advance in step with each other” (Malcom, 1990, p.200). Therefore, it is possible to see that the Soviet foreign policy was not being de-ideologised through new political thinking; rather, it came more close to the ideology of Western capitalism and liberal democracy. Conclusion Russia did not want anymore to be sealed off from the rest of the world and to close it doors off towards the world. Through the new political thinking, Soviet Russia tried to radically redefine its engagement with the rest of the world. To give the right to self-determination for the East European satellite countries and the subsequent withdrawal of Soviet Red Army from these countries were definitely progressive steps. One could argue that Gorbachevian new political thinking was initially victorious in the realm of international relations but marked a catastrophe at the domestic level. At maximum, the “changes initiated in 1985, albeit rooted in the Soviet Union’s prior development, culminated in a ‘revolution/restoration’, the dialectical interaction of retention and transformation of the old order” (Simon, 2010, p. 447). More than a revolutionary upheaval by the genuinely popular forces, it must be understood as a passive revolution led by the elite coalition that represented the emerging capitalist class in the Soviet Union. More than de-ideologising the Soviet foreign policy, Gorbachev’s new political thinking sought to synthesise between the ideological positions of the Westernisers and the nationalists, thus creating a new ideology (completely detached from the reality of a capitalist dominated world) of Westernised liberal humanism in the realm of Soviet foreign policy. References English, RD 2000, Russia and the idea of the West: Gorbachev, intellectuals, and the end of the cold war, New York, Columbia University Press. Cha. 6. 194-228. Kenez, P 2006, A history of the Soviet Union from the beginning to the end, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Malcom, N 1990, “Destalinization and Soviet foreign policy: The roots of ‘New Thinking” , in Hasegawa, T and Pravda, A, Perestroika: Soviet domestic and foreign policies, London, Sage Publishers. Cha. 9, pp. 178- 205. Simon, R 2010, “Passive revolution, perestroika, and the emergence of the new Russia”, Capital & Class, Vol. 34, No. 3, pp. 429-448. Tsygankov, AP 2006, Russia’s foreign policy: Change and continuity in national identity, Oxford, Rowman and Littlefield Publishers. Yurchak, A 2005, Everything was forever, Until it was no more, Princeton, Princeton University Press. Read More