Socialism Betrayed: Behind the Collapse of the Soviet Union

Contents

Preface

1. Introduction

2. Two Trends in Soviet Politics

3. The Second Economy

4. Promise and Foreboding, 1985-86

5. Turning Point, 1987-88

6. Crisis and Collapse, 1989-91

7. Conclusions and Implications

Epilogue–

A Critique of Explanations of the Soviet Collapse

Endnotes

Preface to the Second Edition

Socialism Betrayed was first published by International Publishers in 2004, for which we would like to extend our appreciation to International’s Director, Betty Smith. That the first edition sold out was largely due to the favorable reviews and publicity the book garnered in the United States by reviewer Mark Almberg of the People’s Weekly World and in Britain by the Morning Star, Ireland by the Socialist Voice, Canada by the People’s Voice and The Spark, Australia by The Guardian and Australian Marxist Review, and Germany by Marxistische Blaetter. We thank the editors and reviewers of these periodicals. Though reviewers largely ignored the book in the United States, the book did gain critical notice in Political Affairs, Science & Society, and Nature, Society and Thought. Since critical notice is better than no notice, we would like to thank those reviewers as well.

Since 2004, Socialism Betrayed has been translated into several languages. We would like to take the opportunity of the second English edition to thank those who in various ways aided its publication abroad. Irina Malenko and Blagovesta Doncheva, have been great friends and enthusiastic and tireless advocates of the book, and their efforts were primarily responsible for the book’s publication in Bulgarian and Russian. We cannot thank them enough. We are also grateful to Dr. Ivan Ivanov for the Russian translation and Algoritm Press for the Russian edition. The Persian edition of the book was due to Mohammad Mehryar and Feridon Darafshi, who took the book from the U.S. to Iran and introduced it to one of the heroes of the struggle for Iranian freedom, Mohammad Ali Amooii (sometimes spelled Amoui), who liked the book well enough to translate it himself. We owe deep debt of gratitude to all three men. In Greece, part of the book appeared in KOMEP, the journal of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) edited by Eleni Bellou. She and her colleagues Kyrillos Papastavrou, Vasilis Opsimou, Babis Angourakis and Nikos Seratakis arranged for the authors to attend in December 2007 an international conference in Athens on the causes of the Soviet demise. This conference acquainted others with the book, including Francisco Melo, editor of Vertices. He and his colleagues, including Maria Antunes, engineered the translation and publication of the book in Portugal, where under the title, O Socialismo Traido, the book has gone through two printings . Aytek Alpan initiated the publication of the book in Turkey. Henri Alleg and Emmanuel Tang played a similar role in France, and through their initiative the book will be published by Editions Delga headed by Aymeric Monville. In expressing our thanks, we would point out that the considerable effort on the part of all of these people arose not from material gain but entirely from their belief that the book had value and deserved a wide readership.

The second edition of Socialism Betrayed is due to the generous support of the Dogwood Foundation for Socialist Education. We would like to thank the Foundation and its Director Paul Bjarnason for the confidence they have shown in our work.