MIKHAIL GORBACHEV

Mikhail Gorbachev
1931–2022
A man of peace

Mikhail Gorbachev was the last leader of the Soviet Union, serving as General Secretary of the Communist Party from 1985 to 1991. Since then, he has maintained an active role in world affairs through the Gorbachev Foundation, a non-profit organization which promotes democracy and humanitarian initiatives globally.

The New Russia
Translated by Arch Tait

Hardback
ISBN: 9 781509 503872
464 pages
Price £25 / $35 (before discount)

Polity Press
Cambridge, 2016

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"His new book, winningly translated by Englishman  Arch Tait, is a surprisingly funny and plainspoken account of the chaos and economic ruin that followed the fall of the USSR."

Fortune magazine, New York

After years of rapprochement, the relationship between Russia and the West is more strained now than it has ever been in the past 25 years. Putin's motives, his reasons for seeking confrontation with the West, remain for many a mystery. Not for Mikhail Gorbachev. In this new work, Russia's elder statesman draws on his wealth of knowledge and experience to reveal the development of Putin's regime and the intentions behind it. He argues that in order to further his own personal power, Putin has corrupted the achievements of perestroika and created a system which offers no future for Russia. Faced with this, Gorbachev advocates a radical reform of politics and new fostering of pluralism and social democracy.

Gorbachev's insightful analysis moves beyond internal politics to address wider problems in the region, including the Ukraine conflict, as well as the global challenges of poverty and climate change. Above all else, he insists that solutions are to be found by returning to the atmosphere of dialogue and cooperation which was so instrumental in ending the Cold War.

This book represents the summation of Gorbachev's thinking on the course that Russia has taken since 1991 and stands as a testament to one of the greatest and most influential statesmen of the 20th century. 

"Gorbachev was on the right side of history. One day the Russian people will recognize that they have as much reason to be grateful to him as do the rest of us. This important book explains why."

Sir Malcolm Rifkind, Former Foreign Secretary and Defence Secretary
of the United Kingdom

"Mikhail Gorbachev, with his prodigious intellect, vast experience and powers of perception, gives us his views spanning from his time in office to the present day. As he says 'Life teaches you more than any teacher' - and we all can learn by reading this account of his extraordinary life."

George P. Shultz, former Secretary of State and Secretary of the Treasury of the United States