The Fall of Communism

As I have done before, I enjoy applying theories of Public Choice to what I am learning in my Fall of Communism class. The Soviet Union’s collapse was ultimately a result of its leaders acting in their own self-interest. Given opposition movements in Eastern Europe, domestic reforms and openness, and mounting nationalism in Soviet republics, the Communist Party leaders realized that they could best preserve their power by becoming what the people wanted, thus dissolving the Soviet Union on December 8, 1991. In Armageddon Averted, Stephen Kotkin writes, “It was the central elite, rather than the independence movements of the periphery, that cashiered the Union” (107).

Ideology aside, Soviet leaders were rational, utility-maximizing agents acting in political markets, just as Buchanan and Tullock established as the foundation of public choice economics. More specifically, their actions are consistent with Downs’ assumption of political actors as vote-maximizers. Domestic reforms (in hopes of rejuvenating communism) in the late 1980s increased the channels through which citizen voters could reveal their preferences, including through public gatherings, published letters to the editor, and independent political organization. Foreseeing their ideology’s doom, Soviet leaders abandoned the Communist Party to become nationalist leaders. This continuity was true for eight out of the fifteen newly independent nations. Consumed with uncertainty, however, the following years would be plagued with policy zigzags and troubled reform. As Downs argues, these individuals formulated policies to win elections rather than won elections in order to formulate policies. Ex-Communist leaders were vote-maximizers.