From the essays written by Timothy Garton Ash in The Magic Lantern, on the decline of Communism in Europe, he narrates a live encounter with the communist regime. He describes how Mikhail Gorbachev then a young leader wanted to include the facts and guiding principles of the soviet economic structures in his leadership. Gorbachev claimed his administration would not inflict the communists’ guiding principles on the communists’ organizations in the eastern and central Europe. This statement led to the termination of political, financial and military ties between these nations and the Soviet Union. This came after the communists organizations re-grouped after the fall of the Berlin wall that saw the merging of the two Germany states (Ash, 1993). A stark pointer of the end of the cold war; the Soviet Union stood isolated as the only communist state. Its leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, was sidelined by the radical groups, which tried to overthrow him but failed in a military coup organised by the Eastern Europe regimes.
The early communist groups changed their course with the hope of spreading the revolution thus becoming more isolated with the defeat of the Greek communists in the 1944-1949 civil wars. Then western parties, through concurrence with the Soviet Union, searched for a more distinguished ‘western’ advancement to communism. This was followed by the Marxist facts in Europe that de-Stalinized the Soviet Union and led to the easing of the cold war in the 1950’s. This impelled a number of nations to adopt a nationwide policy of communism in an effort to acquaint themselves to the conditions prevailing in different European countries. Consequently, many a communist nation lost grip of the pro longed financial boom propagated by the Western Europe entrepreneurs who had established themselves from the 60s (Making of history 1989). Next emerged the euro-communists, they were partially influential in both Italy and Spain and were led by the orthodox communists. They further gravely ruined the soviets.
The incapacitation of the Soviet Union led to the redefining of what communism was. This brought all the rejuvenations of communism to an abrupt stop forcing Europe’s communist stand holders to reflect eclectic legacy. A number of communist nations were subsequently compelled to down play the Marxist-Leninist recommendations and grapple with the broader agendas of nature, gender and anti-globalization movements (Ash, 1993). As a result, all groups which had emerged and linked themselves with communism remained largely unknown in Europe.
Several movements arose, after the fall of the Berlin wall with the reformers taking political power signifying the start of the end of the 40 years governance of the communist dictatorial rule. This reform designated the end of communism in the east and central Europe and it started in Poland. This is because the solidarity, ‘an anti-communist trades union and a communal movement’, compelled the Poland communist’s government to identify them through a wave of mass actions in 1981 which gained global attention. This led to the prohibition of the solidarity movement by the law forcing the association to go underground. They structured their own civil society where the insubordinate Poles removed the communist administration from their community (Communism in Europe). This was followed by a fight by the Czechs and Slovaks who held mass action with demands for reforms in Czechoslovakia. This forced the communist party of the Czech to move the political base to Havel and hand power to the Czech reformers, in a serenely and calmly manner that became widely known as the velvet revolution. In the Eastern Europe countries such as Romania, the communist administration was overthrown by dissents and military wars. Consequently, political power was ceded to the communist parties in Bulgaria and Albania. These revolutions continued until 1989, when the last revolution; the 1989 revolution experienced in the Communist Soviet manifested the end of communism in Europe (Making of history 1989).
Ash illustrates immorality as represented by the communist leadership. This led to a raise in revolutions after the communist leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, promoted spectacular economic reforms that attempted to move the economy away from the communist system to a spread out system prevalent in western democracies. The eastern European nations were consequently prompted to re-examine the interests of the soviets towards a democratic system. As a result, these nations organized their citizens into groups to fight for democracy in the Eastern Europe countries (Ash, 1993).
Thus, Ash tries to explain the fall of communism in Eastern Europe countries as a consequence of a group of socialists in these nations creating a hostile environment around the ruling elite. This is attested to in the Bolshevik Revolution that saw the multi tribal soviets topple autonomist Russia together with its dominion in 1917. The Bolshevik Revolution was followed by a series of protests in several countries of Eastern Europe region, which struggled for independence (Communism in Europe).
The foremost causative instigator of these revolutions was due to the collapse of the communist leadership governance when compared to the democratic industrialist nations of Europe. This was attributed to the failure of the communist leader, Mikhail Gorbachev’s distribution of the soviet economy as done by capitalist countries such as USA. Gorbachev’s programmed reforms opened relationship with other nations. This caused the communists who believed that Mikhail Gorbachev had failed, to plan a coup which failed. He led the Soviet Union in unparalleled way which failed the communist’s foundation paving way to the capitalist revolutionists (Making of history 1989). Most of the accomplishments which Gorbachev is credited with are the revolutions and movements which were organised in different areas of the Eastern European territory leading to several nations breaking-away from the Soviet Union. This led to the rise of capitalistic nations that reigned after the dissolution of communism (Communism in Europe).
The revolutionary movements were distinctive when compared to the 1968 revolts in that their leaders had support from nations that had an already established capitalistic structure. Additionally, they liaised with other communist leaders and leaders of democratic and capitalistic nations such as USA (Communism in Europe). Also the dissident groups were at the same time internationally recognized by international bodies which could sanction their communist nations if they attempted to harm them.
This was manifested in Poland when the Polish socialist government was impelled to recognise the Solidarity movement which had conducted a wave of mass actions in 1981, grabbing global attention. Therefore, the citizenry hoped that the Eastern Europe nations would at last budge from communism and become capitalistic and democratic like their newly friendly nations (Communism in Europe). This made them to perpetuate mass actions as a strategy to fight for their freedom from communism. One of the major challenges they encountered when introducing capitalism was the derivation of constitutions that favoured a new kind of laws. They had to seek open minded leaders who would govern the citizenry.
Works cited
Ash Timothy Garton, 1993, “The magic lantern” the revolution of ’89 witnessed in Warsaw, Budapest, Berlin, and Prague, Vintage Series, p100-150.
“Communism in Europe”, The End of Communism. Web.
“Making of history 1989”, The Fall of Communism in Eastern Europe. Web.