Imagine if you lived in Moscow when the Soviet Union collapsed. Perestroika began in 1985, and Gorbachev launched reforms to open up the political system. In 1991, the Soviet Union dissolved and this led to economic hardship in some countries that were part of it. This ended communism in Russia forever.įor many years, Russia had been going through a process of reform. The next day, he dissolved the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He had his vice president arrested on charges of treason. Soon enough, the soldiers sided with the protesters, and Gorbachev’s government backed down. However, they failed and thousands of people took to the streets to protest against the GKChP.

On August 19, 1991, a group known as the General Committee on State Emergency (GKChP) attempted to stage a coup in Moscow while President Mikhail Gorbachev was away. Big Idea #1: Perestroika brought monumental changes to Soviet Russia. He’ll also discuss how people chose suicide at the fall of the Soviet Union and how one man continued to drink vodka with his colleague who had made his life hell. The author will explain why the victims of the Soviet gulags continued to support Communism, even after they were released from their labor camps. These are voices usually left out of history books or forgotten after major events take place they’re also not often heard in our own country’s political debates today with all their talk about socialism vs capitalism (a debate which is largely meaningless because both systems ultimately lead us down similar paths). From interviews conducted between 19, we glean fascinating insights into ordinary people’s lives during this time period. This should have been a relief, right? Here we’ll get to know the feelings of the people who lived through the transition from Soviet Union to Russia and other states when Communism died out. In a short period in the early 1990s, that entire structure vanished. They were born into a society governed by a Communist regime that upheld state ideology as though it were religious doctrine and suppressed other views. This is exactly what happened to the people of Russia. If you suddenly found out everything you knew was wrong, how would you feel? How would your memory of the past change? What new things could you learn from this experience to help adapt to a new world order? 1-Page Summary of Secondhand Time Overview

Svetlana alexievich secondhand time