Perestroika was a political reform movement within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) during the late 1980s widely associated with CPSU general secretary Mikhail Gorbachev and his glasnost policy reform. The literal meaning of perestroika is "restructuring", referring to the restructuring of the political and economic systems of the Soviet Union, in an attempt to end the Era of Stagnation.
5 kopeck perestroika commemorative postage stamp, 1988
"Wall of Sorrow" at the first exhibition of the victims of Stalinism in Moscow, 19 November 1988
A young boy and Ronald Reagan in Red Square, Moscow, 1988
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), at some points known as the Russian Communist Party, All-Union Communist Party and Bolshevik Party, and sometimes referred to as the Soviet Communist Party (SCP), was the founding and ruling political party of the Soviet Union. The CPSU was the sole governing party of the Soviet Union until 1990 when the Congress of People's Deputies modified Article 6 of the 1977 Soviet Constitution, which had previously granted the CPSU a monopoly over the political system. The party's main ideology was Marxism–Leninism.
A neighborhood in the Kozhukhovsky Bay of the Moskva River with a large sign promoting the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Moscow, 1975
Vladimir Lenin, founder of the Soviet Union and the leader of the Bolshevik party.
Leon Trotsky, founder of the Red Army and a key figure in the October Revolution.
The Brezhnev era is commonly referred to by historians as the Era of Stagnation, a term coined by CPSU General Secretary Gorbachev.