AP® European History · Unit 9 · Topic 9.7
The Soviet Collapse and After
The Soviet Union dissolved in 1991 because Gorbachev's own reforms let long-suppressed nationalism and economic failure boil over, and a failed hardline coup that August destroyed the center's last authority.
Gorbachev came to power in 1985 wanting to save communism, not end it. Glasnost (openness) let people criticize the system publicly for the first time in decades, and perestroika (restructuring) tried to loosen the planned economy without fully freeing it. Instead of reviving the Union, these reforms exposed how little legitimacy the Communist Party had left. Once censorship eased, republics from the Baltics to the Caucasus openly demanded independence, and the central government had no good way to stop them without the mass violence Gorbachev refused to use.
The breaking point came in August 1991. Hardline party and military officials, terrified that a new treaty would turn the Soviet Union into a loose confederation, placed Gorbachev under house arrest and tried to seize control. The coup collapsed within three days, partly because Boris Yeltsin, president of the Russian republic, rallied resistance in Moscow and the army refused to fire on crowds. But the plotters' failure did the opposite of what they intended: it proved the central government could no longer enforce its own authority. Republic after republic declared independence that autumn, and by December 1991 the Soviet Union legally ceased to exist, replaced by fifteen separate states.
What followed was not liberation into prosperity. Russia's 1990s shock therapy, lifting price controls and privatizing state industry almost overnight, caused output to collapse, hyperinflation to wipe out savings, and male life expectancy to fall sharply as social safety nets disappeared. Germany's path ran differently: reunification in October 1990 extended West Germany's currency and market system eastward instantly, but rebuilding the former East required decades of costly transfers, since eastern factories could not compete at western prices.
Key terms
- Glasnost
- Gorbachev's policy of political openness that allowed public criticism of the Soviet system after 1985.
- Perestroika
- Gorbachev's program to restructure and partly liberalize the Soviet planned economy.
- Shock therapy
- Rapid removal of price controls and privatization of state industry in Russia during the 1990s.
- August 1991 coup
- A failed attempt by hardline officials to remove Gorbachev and preserve the Union, which instead hastened its collapse.
Watch it explained
- How it worksShow me the Soviet Union breaking into fifteen republics on a map with dates for each.
- How it worksHow did the failed coup of August 1991 accelerate exactly what it meant to stop?
- Worked exampleTrace Russian output and life expectancy through the shock therapy years of the 1990s.
- Going furtherWhat happened to Germany's map and economy when the two halves reunified in 1990?
Check yourself
End of topic.