Perestroika

Perestroika was one of the policies introduced to the Soviet Union by Mikhail Gorbachev in 1985. Perestroika was used to mean 'economic restructuring'. Gorbachev realised the Soviet Union economy was failing and felt the communist system need not to be replaced, but to certainly be reformed, and this would be done by the process of perestroika. A key part of perestroika was to reduce the amount of money being spent on defence, and to do this Gorbachev felt the Soviet Union should;

• Pull out of Afghanistan.
• Negotiate with the USA about arms reductions.
• Cease interfering in other communist countries (The Sinatra Doctrine).

See also glasnost.