No Era of Stagnation...

AsGryffynn

Banned
Not sure if I made this one before but, what would've been the consequences of the Era of Stagnation not happening during Brezhnev's years in charge? In fact, out of sheer curiosity, what would have been the consequences of economic growth acceleration during that time period?
 
Well, I think that how you answer this question depends greatly on how you explain the cause of the problems of the Brezhnev era in the first place. I've read a few things about this era and specifically Soviet economic performance in it (some of which contradict each other), and there are various factors at work.

While the USSR's economy, according to its own figures and those of western analysts, continued to grow, it was not growing at the same rates as it had in the past. Part of this could be a sort of diminishing returns - having already established an industrialized welfare state out of an impoverished peasant nation in about 1 generation, the biggest problems were dealt with. But it's also true that the USSR was behind the west in information technology (I have read some material that shows that US intelligence deliberately introduced faulty electronics as imports to the USSR in order to hinder them in this area, but either way the fact was that they didn't have the same capabilities as the west at that time) and in some other scientific fields as well. So a more developed Soviet electronics/computing complex could be one way to push towards a more energetic Soviet economy during this time.

That said, I think the more significant part of "stagnation" was not the economic aspect but the lack of political engagement on the part of the population, and the growing popularity of liberal economic and political ideas among some parts of the intelligentsia. Even if the Soviet economy was doing better, if you end up with a Gorbachev in the driver's seat, that will start a snowball effect of concessions to the west and domestic changes that empower those liberal elements, making a collapse as OTL more likely. Even when it came to the August coup, a majority of party organizations (and if opinion polls from a few years later are to be believed, the population at large) supported the goals of the coup, but more important than numerical majority was political will and engagement.

So for me, the question then becomes how to ensure more political engagement on the part of the Soviet population, something that you would probably have to go back to the 50's or 60's to do. Possibly getting rid of Andropov's health problems might also open a window, but that's a much shorter period of time to work with as far as counterfactuals go.
 

AsGryffynn

Banned
Well, I think that how you answer this question depends greatly on how you explain the cause of the problems of the Brezhnev era in the first place. I've read a few things about this era and specifically Soviet economic performance in it (some of which contradict each other), and there are various factors at work.

While the USSR's economy, according to its own figures and those of western analysts, continued to grow, it was not growing at the same rates as it had in the past. Part of this could be a sort of diminishing returns - having already established an industrialized welfare state out of an impoverished peasant nation in about 1 generation, the biggest problems were dealt with. But it's also true that the USSR was behind the west in information technology (I have read some material that shows that US intelligence deliberately introduced faulty electronics as imports to the USSR in order to hinder them in this area, but either way the fact was that they didn't have the same capabilities as the west at that time) and in some other scientific fields as well. So a more developed Soviet electronics/computing complex could be one way to push towards a more energetic Soviet economy during this time.

That said, I think the more significant part of "stagnation" was not the economic aspect but the lack of political engagement on the part of the population, and the growing popularity of liberal economic and political ideas among some parts of the intelligentsia. Even if the Soviet economy was doing better, if you end up with a Gorbachev in the driver's seat, that will start a snowball effect of concessions to the west and domestic changes that empower those liberal elements, making a collapse as OTL more likely. Even when it came to the August coup, a majority of party organizations (and if opinion polls from a few years later are to be believed, the population at large) supported the goals of the coup, but more important than numerical majority was political will and engagement.

So for me, the question then becomes how to ensure more political engagement on the part of the Soviet population, something that you would probably have to go back to the 50's or 60's to do. Possibly getting rid of Andropov's health problems might also open a window, but that's a much shorter period of time to work with as far as counterfactuals go.

Well, the whole point of the thread is seeing if the accelerating economic growth would do something for the Soviets... Even if it doesn't, it would be interesting to see how the USSR somehow collapses yet all it's constituent countries were growing up until then.
 
Well, the whole point of the thread is seeing if the accelerating economic growth would do something for the Soviets... Even if it doesn't, it would be interesting to see how the USSR somehow collapses yet all it's constituent countries were growing up until then.

I see, I see. Well, at a guess, there would be more for investors/oligarchs to sell off in a few years, maybe more hot money going into the global economy, leading to an earlier construction boom and consequently earlier burst of that bubble. If there are more people with knowledge and experience of computer science and electronics in the USSR, maybe you could see an earlier emergence of offshoring by software companies looking to take advantage of a large quantity of educated workers who are suddenly thrown out of work. The post-Soviet Russian might become a Silicon Valley stereotype.

Once the wreckage and misery of what were the Yeltsin years OTL were cleared away, there might be a stronger tech sector in Russia and the other successor republics, but that's 10 or 15 years out.

Since the collapse wasn't really due to fundamentally economic issues, it's a little difficult to directly extrapolate consequences of this pod. Like I mentioned before, the Soviet economy never really stopped growing, never had what is conventionally defined as a recession. Despite its flaws, it was plodding along, doing acceptable if not spectacular, until the late 1980s and Gorbachev.
 

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
Donor
Monthly Donor
...in a way, in OTL with the geopolitical and ideological concessions of the Gorbachev and the reformist elite, they actually live out the American conservative's nightmare scenario that they think would have happened if the the further left candidates in America, like George McGovern or Dennis Kucinich, had ever taken the Presidency and had a like-minded congress?
 
...in a way, in OTL with the geopolitical and ideological concessions of the Gorbachev and the reformist elite, they actually live out the American conservative's nightmare scenario that they think would have happened if the the further left candidates in America, like George McGovern or Dennis Kucinich, had ever taken the Presidency and had a like-minded congress?

Some effect but not that much. The biggest problem was the Five Year Plan. By using them you stifle technological advance because every time you use new technology you have to retool the plan. Also it cuts off very meaningful information about scarcity. There is no known quicker and easier way to find out how scarce something is at the moment than having prices.
 
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