Which Factors Contributed to the Collapse of Soviet Union by 1991, Developments Within or Outside the Ussr?

The Soviet Union was formally dissolved in December 1991, which marked the end of Cold War. When the Soviet Union fell, it ended the tenure of a superpower with the resources of more than a dozen countries. In my opinion, the main factor that contributed to the collapse of the USSR was the internal development. This includes the structural weaknesses of the USSR and policies that introduced by Gorbachev such as Perestroika, Glasnost and Demokratizatsiya.

First of all, the ineffectiveness of Perestroika brought great suffer to the Russian people. There was no increase in overall output as industries focused on producing more expansive goods since there was now an absence of a central planning mechanism. This meant shortages in some of the basic necessities, even worse than the pre-Gorbachev era, which at least had control over production decisions. The flexible pricing system also led to a growth of black markets in the USSR as speculators bought goods from fixed-price shops and sold it in the black market at higher prices. This led to overall shortages of day-to-day necessities. At the same time, there was a growth in the black market and sharp increases in the prices of goods as producers profited from the acute shortages of basic necessities. The Russian people therefore suffered a lot from this policy as there was a shortage of basic goods and those basic goods were sold in a high price which was not affordable by many of the poorer Russian people. This led to great sentiment against the government because of their ineffectiveness in bringing a promised better economy and life. Therefore, the Russian people started to protest and demanded a change in the government. And because of Gorbachev’s another policy, Glasnost, which allowed people to openly criticize the government, the communist party soon lost the support of the Russian people, which eventually led to the break down of the Soviet Union.

In addition to Perestroika, the USSR’s economy was stagnated. The USSR practiced command economy which showed great ineffectiveness in the late 1980s. Since all economic planning took place in Moscow, the central planners were unfamiliar with the actual situation in various parts of the USSR and thus setting unrealistic targets. This means that the industrial output suffered. The command economy also focused too much on quantity, rather than quality of the products. The Russians suffered a lot from this as they could not get good quality goods, especially clothes and shoes in winter. In addition, the USSR also focused too much on heavy industries because of the arms race with the US. This affected the agricultural productivity which led to the shortage of food. The command economy did not promote innovation, resulting in the Soviet Union lagging behind in areas such as computers, electronics, communications and even automobile production. The Soviet people had nothing entertain after a long day of tiring work. This