In this 1994 book Graeme Gill traces the disintegration of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until the dissolution of the USSR in December 1991. Based principally on the contemporary Soviet press, the book to follows the debates in the party over the implications of Gorbachev's reforms and how the party should respond to them. It is an in-depth analysis of the institutional dynamics of a party under pressure. When it came under challenge...