The New Soviet Plan

Among the many conflicts in the U.S.S.R. in the summer of 1990, none was more riveting or important than the clash between Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin, the chairman of the parliament of the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic (R.S.F.S.R.). Since last May Yeltsin has been on the attack, accusing Gorbachev of dragging his feet on the introduction of market reforms and of denying Russia its sovereignty. The demand for sovereignty has been popular among Russians convinced that their lives would improve dramatically if they could only liberate their republic's resources from the hands of Moscow bureaucrats. For other republics it was an immense boost to have Russia-the core of the U.S.S.R. and Gorbachev's power base-join their side in their battles with the central government. The call for a rapid move toward a market economy also found enormous resonance in a population frightened by the combination of a chaotic economy and a government helpless in the face of the decline of the Soviet Union.

For Gorbachev, skilled politician that he is, Yeltsin's approach and its appeal could hardly have come as a surprise. The Soviet president must have watched with a tinge of envy as his old rival used his advantage as a leader of the opposition to insist that the problems were easier to confront than the leadership supposed and, in particular, that introducing a market economy need not be painful if only it were handled well.

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