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Причины распада СССР сквозь призму теории систем
The article describes some theoretical approaches to the logic of the USSR’s historical development. After considering «traditional» ideographic historiography, it gives a description of contemporary economical, historical, political and macrosocio-logical approaches to the USSR studies. The author suggests that Luhmann’s systems theory as well as postmodernist philosophy be used, which is necessary in order to find the answer to the question, what Gorbachev was able to do to make the soviet system fall? The article attempts to adapt the postmodernist point of view to the needs of the «nomothetic» one. The main concept this article deals with is the notion of institutionalizing discourse, which has been identified as Luhman’s self-reference of political systems essential for their existence. The paper considers the USSR collapse as resulted from the changes in institutionalizing discourse that Gorbachev had introduced. The article contrasts some distinctive features of the USSR’s political system discourse before and after 1987. Such main discourse features as the single-party dominance, the belief in the necessity of the 1917 revolution and the confrontation with capitalistic countries had been abandoned and the system could no longer function. This event determined the conflict of elites which, in its turn, accelerated the delegitimization of the regime. Thus the article tries to outline the environment and conditions which gave opportunity to the destructive forces to disintegrate the USSR.