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History Optional PYQ Master Pack · Model answer

“By the 1980s, the Communist system of the Soviet Union was incapable of maintaining the country’s role as a Superpower.” Elucidate.

  • UPSC 2013
  • Disintegration of the Soviet Union and the Rise of the Unipolar World

By the 1980s the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) had governed for over six decades without ever seeking popular legitimation, and this absence of democratic consent had hardened into a crisis of belief that no amount of military or economic strength could offset.

You are reading the opening of the model answer. The full answer is part of the History Optional PYQ Master Pack.

What the full answer covers

  • The Absence of a Democratic Base
  • Nomenklatura Privilege and the Corruption of the Elite
  • Dissent, Suppressed Nationalities, and the Erosion of Consent
  • Glasnost: Exposing Rather than Repairing the Legitimacy Gap
  • The Widening Gulf Between Ideology and Everyday Life

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