... the notion of 'changes' is paradoxical when the era is marked by great conservatism. Consequently, there are many factors to debate in discussion of the assertion that 'the period of apparent stagnation saw vital social, economic and cultural changes which by the early 1980s had brought the Soviet Union to the verge of crisis'. The economic situation by the early 1980s is perhaps the most powerful for suggesting the USSR verged on crisis. It seems implausible that the entire 'stagnation' period to economic crisis for initially, recognition that the economy was doing badly and determination to achieve parity with the USA, led to Kosygin's 1965 reform programme. However, this was halted due to concern, bolstered by events in Czechoslovakia in 1968, that economic change could stimulate demands for political democratisation - economic conservatism would thereafter shape the period. The two chief sectors of the economy were agriculture and industry. On ...

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