fake good reviews
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it is important to emphasize that the research specialization of the academic
think tanks and the expert advice they provided to the leadership did not turn
them into genuine pressure groups. |
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even when
they were headed by progressively minded directors, such as anushavan arzumanian (directed imemo in the late 1950s and the first
half of the 1960s), georgy arbatov (longtime director of the usa and
canada institute from 1967 to 1995), and evgeny primakov (in the
1970s and 1980s directed first the institute of oriental studies and
then imemo), the research institutes?influence on the party-state
leadership was limited and depended on the experts?ability to
persuade political leaders, by the strength of their arguments, to
take their recommendations seriously.
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often their advice simply could not reach the intended addressee. in
the closing years of brezhnev抯 occupancy written recommendations
were prevented from being forwarded directly to the supreme
party-government officials. instead, all mail had to be sent to the
general department of the central committee to be sifted through by
nameless functionaries. as a result, experts?proposals often ended
up in a waste bin, or were occasionally forwarded to the central
committee departments, and only rarely reached the desks of the top
leaders.
all
these difficulties notwithstanding, the expansion of a scholarly
community strongly oriented toward policy questions prepared the
necessary groundwork for significant changes in foreign and domestic
policy decision making introduced in the late 1980s. a pool of human
resources was created that could be used in posts more directly
involved in policy making. economists especially were sometimes
drawn into the ministry of foreign affairs; politically oriented
scholars were more often recruited for work in the central committee
apparatus, especially in the groups of consultants of the central
committee, working full-time on long-range questions.
until the advent of gorbachev, however, the movement of scholars
into posts in policy-making bodies was not large. the party
continued to guard jealously its power monopoly and treated with
suspicion the activities of the elite groups, which could undermine
its self-assigned leading role in society. despite some leeway they
enjoyed, soviet experts remained relatively unimportant as a
political force. the official world continued to manipulate
traditional doctrinal stereotypes of class struggle, cold war, and
xenophobia. decision-making practices favored established
institutions like the military. obsessive security-mindedness and
compartmentalization of debate restricted the flow of information
and discussion.
