Censorship In The USSR

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During the 1980s the USSR was deteriorating regarding their economy and standard of living, as the USSR seemed to prioritize military and industrial production at the expense of the basic consumer goods and agricultural sector, moreover the economy took an ever worse downturn in 1986 when the Chernobyl incident happened where a nuclear power plant had a series of explosions, resulting in the spread of radioactive material in the area. Kremlin at the time faced human and environmental chaos and the economic costs were too much and the soviet government could not afford it. That was the point where the USSR was in immense need for reform. After that there were three soviet leaders after that all died within a year of power. That is when Mikhail …show more content…
This reform included lifting the restrictions on information and debate, which had been part of Soviet existence since the 1920s. Gorbachev yearned that glasnost would uncover the faults of preceding governments, so the people would be more open to extensive economic reforms. Media censorship was relaxed, but not completely eliminated which in effect permitted writers and journalists to unearth news of government’s corruption; literature that was once banned in the USSR was now tolerable.As, the Soviet public who were under the impression they were living in a successful communist state began to notice just how drab their lives were, in contrast to the capitalist West. In 1989, Russian viewers tuned in to live broadcasts from the Congress of People’s Deputies, meeting for the first time with democratically elected members. What they saw astonished them, as delegates spent weeks criticizing leaders past and present, the government, bureaucracy, the military, even the much-feared KGB. Its goals were to include more people in the political process through freedom of expression. Yet, the totalitarian state existing since 1917 was hard to disassemble, and once it fell apart, citizens were not adapted to the absence of regulation and command. The outburst of information about escalating crime and crimes by the government caused panic in the people. This caused an increase in social protests in a nation used to living under the strictest government control, and went against the goals of
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