First published in 1982, this book explores how Khrushchev and Brezhnev manipulated their policies and personal images as they attempted to consolidate their authority as leader. Central issues of Soviet domestic politics are examined: investment priorities, incentive policy, administrative reform, and political participation. The author rejects the conventional images of Khrushchev as an embattled consumer advocate and decentraliser, and of Brezhnev’s leadership as dull and conservative. He looks at how they dealt with the task of devising programs that combined the post-Stalin elite’s goals of consumer satisfaction and expanded political participation with traditional Soviet values.

Gorbachev and Yeltsin as Leaders also compares these men with Khrushchev and Brezhnev, yielding new insight into the nature of Soviet and post-Soviet politics and into the dynamics of "transformational" leadership more generally. The book is an important contribution to the analysis and evaluation of political leadership. It is well written and accessible to the nonspecialist."--Jacket.

Leonid Brezhnev was leader of the Soviet Union for almost two decades when it was at the height of its powers. This book is a long overdue reappraisal of Brezhnev the man and the system over which he ruled. By incorporating much of the new material available in Russian, it challenges the received wisdom about the Brezhnev years, and provides a fascinating insight into the life and times of one of the twentieth century's most neglected political leaders.

Drawing connections between the domestic political experiences of these leaders and their behavior toward the United States during key foreign policy events, Goldgeier offers fresh interpretations of the Berlin blockade crisis of 1948, the Cuban missile crisis of 1961, the Middle East war of 1973, and German reunification in 1989-90. He argues that the defining moment in the development of a Soviet leader's style came during the period when the leader acted to consolidate power and neutralize adversaries in order to succeed a dead or deposed leader. Success in this period confirmed the effectiveness of the leader's first truly independent political action and shaped his distinctive political style - a style that reappeared in international bargaining.

**** Previous edition (1966) cited in BCL3. This updated edition follows the implications of Khrushchev's earlier reform efforts for subsequent regimes through Gorbachev, raising intriguing parallels between the Khrushchev and Gorbachev regimes. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

The Soviet Union Under Brezhnev provides an accessible post-Soviet perspective on the history of the USSR from the mid-1960’s to the mid-1980’s. It challenges both the ‘evil empire’ image of the USSR that was widespread in the early 1980’s and the ‘stagnation’ label attached to the period by Soviet reformers under Gorbachev. The book makes use of a range of memoirs, interviews, archival documents and other sources not available before 1990 to place Brezhnev and his epoch in a broader historical context. The author: examines high politics, foreign policy and policy making explores broader social, cultural and demographic trends presents a picture of Soviet society in the crucial decades prior to the upheavals and crises of the late 1980’s While stopping well short of a full-scale rehabilitation of Brezhnev, Tompson rejects the prevailing image of the Soviet leader as a colourless non-entity, drawing attention to Brezhnev’s real political skills, as well as his faults, and to the systemic roots of many of the problems he faced.