The short parliament 1989–91: Political elites, societal cleavages and the weakness of party politics

The end of communist rule has been followed by the development of weak, unstable and highly fragmented party systems in most of the countries concerned. In order to understand the weakness of party politics in the former Soviet Union in particular, both ‘objective’ and ‘subjective’ factors, including the behaviour of political elites, need to be taken into account. A detailed analysis of the parliamentary elite in 1989 focuses upon the behaviour of ‘Communists’ and of ‘Democrats’. Without an effective party system, of a kind that the behaviour of these elites would suggest has not yet developed, a democratic legislature (and democracy itself) are unlikely to survive.