I know, that sounds crazy right? Well remember this was attempted by Mikhail Gorbachev to turn the USSR into a modern state that had democratic values, free speech, a capitalist system (of a certain degree, it's hard to imagine them going full American-style for this), and an opening up to the world at large for trade and travel. This idea was proposed as the "Union of Soviet Sovereign Republics", and the movement was known as the "Perestroika". However, this failed in the wake of the August Coup in August 1991, and instead the USSR itself dissolved on December 26 of that year. I heard they were on the verge of succeeding until said Coup which destabilized things so much that there was no hope to keeping the USSR together. So I guess the POD here is that the August Coup was prevented or better suppressed. As such, the USSR becomes a sovereign nation like Gorbachev intended.
One of the things to consider is that the USSR consisted of "Republics", as in plural, kind of like the States of the United States. It wasn't just Russia (but they were the boss nation, no doubt), and one may be surprised to learn how diverse the USSR was with East Slavic, Northern European, Persian, Turkic, and West Asian representation (among notable minorities), and over 20 spoken languages. As a whole, the 15 Republics consisted of:
So thinking of this sovereign nation that's now more democratic is quite a thing to consider, seeing as how you could draw very direct parallels to being this Eurasian counterpart to the United States, and indeed, that's what would happen. In keeping with that idea, I'm guessing the government would be decentralized so that each Republic governs itself but is part of a larger union with Moscow being like the USSR's Washington D.C.. While the Cold War itself may end here, I imagine some kind of international rivalry with the US would still continue that spawns from it, which would be reflected in sports and industry development. That doesn't disappear overnight.
While this all sounds rosy, I'll admit I don't imagine this being a particularly smooth process that goes without a hitch, I mean it failed in our timeline and even in a timeline where it succeeded it would struggle just by nature. You would definitely see criminal organizations form in Russia (you know, Mafiya and all) that would have a wide reach in a nation as large and varied as the USSR. Furthermore, considering just how divorced from the western world the USSR had been for decades, I don't see everyone just welcoming them in with open arms, but would still treat them with caution. Even today, Russia is "on the outs" with European culture and that's due to the USSR. Now imagine a world where the USSR still exists in this form?
Anyways, what do you think would happen in a world where the USSR continued but abandoned communism to become democratic?
One of the things to consider is that the USSR consisted of "Republics", as in plural, kind of like the States of the United States. It wasn't just Russia (but they were the boss nation, no doubt), and one may be surprised to learn how diverse the USSR was with East Slavic, Northern European, Persian, Turkic, and West Asian representation (among notable minorities), and over 20 spoken languages. As a whole, the 15 Republics consisted of:
- Armenia
- Azerbaijan
- Belarus
- Estonia
- Georgia
- Kazakhstan
- Kyrgyzstan
- Latvia
- Lithuania
- Moldova
- Russia
- Tajikistan
- Turkmenistan
- Ukraine
- Uzbekistan
So thinking of this sovereign nation that's now more democratic is quite a thing to consider, seeing as how you could draw very direct parallels to being this Eurasian counterpart to the United States, and indeed, that's what would happen. In keeping with that idea, I'm guessing the government would be decentralized so that each Republic governs itself but is part of a larger union with Moscow being like the USSR's Washington D.C.. While the Cold War itself may end here, I imagine some kind of international rivalry with the US would still continue that spawns from it, which would be reflected in sports and industry development. That doesn't disappear overnight.
While this all sounds rosy, I'll admit I don't imagine this being a particularly smooth process that goes without a hitch, I mean it failed in our timeline and even in a timeline where it succeeded it would struggle just by nature. You would definitely see criminal organizations form in Russia (you know, Mafiya and all) that would have a wide reach in a nation as large and varied as the USSR. Furthermore, considering just how divorced from the western world the USSR had been for decades, I don't see everyone just welcoming them in with open arms, but would still treat them with caution. Even today, Russia is "on the outs" with European culture and that's due to the USSR. Now imagine a world where the USSR still exists in this form?
Anyways, what do you think would happen in a world where the USSR continued but abandoned communism to become democratic?