Soviet Government For Dummies?

[Emperor Norton I]

I was wondering if anyone could explain to me the exact order, setup and mechanism of the Soviet government?

[Shawn Endresen]

...huh?

On paper, it works a lot like any other modern government. Local polities elect (no universal franchise: early on, the electorate was about 10% of the populace, by the end it was about 35%) members to the Central Committee/Congress of People's Deputies, which then selects the members of the Council of Ministers (an upper house of sorts), which determines the members of the Presidium (essentially a Cabinet), whose head is the President/Supreme Soviet. There is an independent judiciary with a supreme court. That's near the end; it changed a lot throughout its history. One version of the Soviet Constitution I;ve seen was 55 pages long - they change it often. It's theoretically federal in structure, with the Republics corresponding to US States.

In practice, the Party Chairman runs the civilian government, and there's always an uneasy three-way dance between the civilian government, the Red Army and the KGB. The Republics are meaningless as decisions are made at the center which they cannot fight. The Central Committee is too large to legislate constructively - 2,250 members at the end - so it meets briefly, appoints a single person or small group of people to deal with a problem, and then fails to oversee those appointees meaningfully. The Council of Ministers has a little over 100 members at the end, so it could have been a legislature, except it didn't try.

[grdja83]

Party appointed bureaucracy, lots and lots of bureaucracy. And for long time till end, "ideological correctness" was not needed, what was needed that your father-in-law, uncle or second cousin had already gotten to a high ranking place so he could set you up somewhere to enable you to start your own climb up the ladder. Symptoms may include extreme cronyism, nepotism, corruption, work inefficiency and complete disregard for someones actual successes and managerial methods.
Economy being completely state run, meaning that no matter how much you try to run the enterprise your are in charge off into the ground and fill your pockets, if you have friends in higher places (and they get their cut, or even just your vote on inner party voting sometimes) you are golden.

Once again, lots and lots of corrupt and inefficient bureaucracy that is appointed by no one but itself and responds to no one but itself.

[Xavier]

Originally Posted by Emperor Norton I

I was wondering if anyone could explain to me the exact order, setup and mechanism of the Soviet government?

Look for yourself: Soviet Politics