New Thinking In Soviet Foreign Policy

Soviet Foreign Policy Today (1991) is the culmination of almost 30 years of observations of Soviet foreign and domestic politics, written at the time of Gorbachev’s great changes. It locates the changes of Gorbachev in the context of the traditional goals and practices of Soviet foreign policy, and it does not shy away from presenting seemingly controversial interpretations of the USSR’s international politics.

Relates the Soviet changes in attitudes, ideas, and practices that he is implementing.

Contains primary source material.

For decades U.S, foreign policy was focused on battling the menace of Soviet communism; then, seemingly overnight, the implacable foe collapsed. How did this extraordinary event come about? Political psychologist Steven Kull argues that only a revolution in the thinking of the country's top leaders can explain the swiftness and comparative peacefulness of the recent political transformation. His analysis, based on probing interviews with Soviet policymakers and on a careful reading of the public record, reveals the painful process by which they came to accept the failure of Leninism and to forge an alternative ideology dubbed "new thinking." Kull assesses the influence of new thinking and other streams of thought on post-Soviet foreign policy and behavior and describes the new challenges they present to Western nations.

This book looks at the new themes and directions that have characterised Soviet foreign policy during the "first" Gorbachev era. Various aspects are studied in detail, such as the shift of attention away from relations with America as being their prime foreign policy concern.