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Article: Time to split. (Soviet Union Communist Party dissension)
- Article from:
- The Economist (US)
- Article date:
- June 30, 1990
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1990 Economist Newspaper Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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AS LENIN would have put it: who, whom? Whether or not next week's party congress goes ahead as planned, the irresistible forces of change in the Soviet Union are about to collide with an immovable object in the shape of the Communist party. The Gorbachev years have shown up the party for what it is: an enormous roadblock in the path of reform. Mr Gorbachev's plans to cut down the party's bureaucrats and break them of their interfering habits have had little effect. The once unthinkable-a formal split between radicals who want to dismantle party controls and conservatives who do not-now looks unavoidable. And a good thing, too.
That is not Mr Gorbachev's ...