Comment on Chinese propaganda is rampant on the fediverse
ChairmanMeow@programming.dev 1 week agoRight up to the end, the majority of people in the USSR wished to retain both the USSR and the system of socialism. This is proven not just from eyewitness reports of support, but also vote totals
This isn’t entirely true. The question posed essentially meant the USSR would reform into a more supranational organisation, granting more sovereignty and independence to the constituent republics. Voting “yes” was basically a vote for “‘less’ Soviet Union”, as there was no option to vote to dissolve it entirely. It’s also why after the yes-vote won, Soviet hardliners tried to coup the government.
When the New Union Treaty wasn’t fully implemented, member republics took it upon themselves to run full independence referendums, which were passed with overwhelming numbers (see the results on en.wikipedia.org/…/Category:Referendums_in_the_So…, 90%+ pro-independence in most countries. Remember, most happened in 1991 just like the Union referendum, and no large population swings to the complete opposite direction that fast). The massive disapproval of the communist party was also very visible, as the vast majority of republics started electing non-communist leaders.
And of course there were people still in favour of the Union, but they were largely outnumbered. Pro-union manifestations were met with large protests that often ended in police action to suppress them. Pro-Union sentiments started increasing again after the economic crises post-collapse, but it has never become so popular again to lead to a reformation.
Cowbee@lemmy.ml 1 week ago
I’m aware that after the votes, crisis in politics caused a dramatic swing in faith in the system. The question of viability of the socialist project wasn’t unclear, however. The dissolution of the USSR was something that happened not due to some inevitable death clock in socialism. Contrary to what you believe, popular opinion can swing that fast, such as in the US Empire, where within a single month sentiment on Israel flipped from overwhelmingly positive to majority negative.
Further, as I already showed, the large majority of people in post-soviet countries feel worse off and/or regret its fall. Socialism was an effective system at meeting the needs of the people, and though liberalization and a harsh recovery process from World War II strained the system, it was not on the way to collapse.
ChairmanMeow@programming.dev 1 week ago
It didn’t go from +90% to -90%. That’s what I mean with the huge ‘swing’ seen here. Negative attitudes on Israel went from 42% to 53% in 3 years time. Yet this supposed “total reversal of opinion” happened in months? Nonsense of course. Remember, the Soviet referendum did not have “dissolution” as an option. People picked the option closest to it.
This is irrelevant to the false notion that the Soviet Union dissolved against what the people wanted at the time, which that graphic is often used to misleadingly suggest.
Even then, opinion polling on the subject is highly unreliable. Even the same pollster slightly rephrasing the question nets wildly different results. In the Baltics opinion is pretty consistent that the fall of the USSR was a good thing. But Belarusians tend to disagree with that. But when Belarusians are asked if they prefer to follow a Soviet system or a western democratic system, they choose the latter. And when another pollster asks them again in the same year, opinions flip again.
There’s certainly a strong sentimental nostalgia towards the Union, though not in all former member states. Yet it seems unlikely the population would be willing to vote it back into existence.
Cowbee@lemmy.ml 1 week ago
People did have a massive swing in opinion. I’m aware that dissolution was not an option, but your claim that people didn’t change their opinion in light of the immense political turmoil between that vote and the second vote requires more evidence than “people don’t change their minds that quickly.” Rather, to the contrary, large shifts in opinion do happen more swiftly than gradually.
Further, the fact that the large majority regret the fall of the soviet union is relevant in showing that it clearly wasn’t as simple as saying everyone hated living in the soviet union, but realized how good they had it afterwards. Polling is often inconsistent not because of bad polling, but political instability caused by the immense fuckery of capitalism and imperialism in these countries, and forces like NATO.
ChairmanMeow@programming.dev 1 week ago
Protests were already widespread in the Union. Several member states had already declared nominal independence from Moscow. Gorbachev was doing damage control and trying his best to keep the Union from fracturing further. Elections in member republics saw huge rises in popularity for noncommunist parties.
The referendum was an attempt to gain the political momentum required for reform, in an ultimate effort to keep the Union together. It was essentially a kind of propaganda attempt to display large support for the reformed Union, made possible because dissolution was not on the ballot.
There was widespread civil discontent before the referendum. Elections saw noncommunists rise to power and several member states declared independence. Then I am somehow to believe that the population first swung all the way back to “actually the Soviet Union is great and we don’t want to leave it” and back to “we should leave the Soviet Union” in a matter of mere months? That is an extraordinary claim that requires extraordinary evidence, which you don’t have. The truth is far simpler: at every point once the civil unrest started, the population voted in favour of less Soviet Union and for more independence, and not the other way around.
My point regarding the phrasing of post-Soviet polling is that the wording drastically changes the outcome. Sure, people aren’t happy about how the 90s turned out and they feel they’re not part of a superpower anymore. They’re not happy with being screwed over by western nations. They say those things were better under the Soviet Union. But ask them if they would go back to such a Union, and suddenly support evaporates. And in several former member states even the first few questions don’t find much Soviet sympathies (eg the Baltics). They want to live in a stronger nation, akin to the Soviet Union, but they do not want to go back to what once was. It isn’t a simple case of “boy we sure had it good”, that does a huge disservice to the diverse and complicated opinions of the Union.