For a long time, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was, along with the United States of America, one of two superpowers. According to many important economic indicators, it occupied the second place in the world, second only to the United States, and in some cases surpassed them.
The USSR achieved tremendous success in the space program, in mining, in the development of remote regions of Siberia and the Far North. Very unexpectedly, it collapsed in December 1991. For what reasons did this happen?
The main socio-ideological reasons for the collapse of the USSR
The USSR included 15 national republics, which were very different in all respects, in industry and agriculture, ethnic composition, languages, religion, mentality, etc. Such a diverse composition concealed a time bomb. To unite the country, which consists of such different parts, a common ideology was used - Marxism-Leninism, which proclaimed its goal to build a classless communist society of "plenty".
However, everyday reality, especially from the second half of the 70s of the last century, was very different from program slogans. It was especially difficult to combine the idea of the impending “abundance” with the shortage of goods.
As a result, the vast majority of the inhabitants of the USSR ceased to believe in ideological cliches.
The natural consequence of this was apathy, indifference, disbelief in the words of the country's leaders, as well as an increase in nationalist sentiments in the Union republics. Gradually, more and more people began to conclude that it was impossible to live on like that.
