Remembering the Miracle of 1989
Publicerad på Project Syndicate This month marks 30 years since Europe – and human civilization generally – began to undergo a miraculous transformation that is now etched in the world’s memory. By the summer of 1989, the Soviet Union was already in terminal decline. The only question was whether communism would disintegrate peacefully, or amid an explosion of violence and devastation. In the Soviet Union itself, Mikhail Gorbachev’s policies of glasnost and perestroika had op