Gorbachev's Strategy of Political Centrism

Abstract

The theoretical arguments of Breslauer, Brown and Hough identify Gorbachev's leadership approach as a strategy of radical centrism, fulfilling the theoretical expectations of a successful transitional leader. However, we know that in terms of Gorbachev's personal success as a leader, the strategy ultimately failed, casting doubt on the individual rationality of centrism as a valid leadership approach in periods of transition. In this paper, we argue that Gorbachev's strategy was indeed rational. But the argument of rationality depends on an understanding that Gorbachev was acting simultaneously in multiple political arenas, and that he was fully aware of these interwoven power structures. Thus, he is assumed to have been a sophisticated strategist. The paradox remains, why did a rational actor using sophisticated strategies eventually fail? We develop an argument based on rational choice theory using multiple-level game analysis to demonstrate the sequential process that may explain this paradox.