An annual collection of selected research and analysis from the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty which is well-known for broadcasting news and information to millions of listeners in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union.

Vojtech Mastny is a Senior Fellow at the National Security Archive, where he coordinates the Parallel History Project on NATO and the Warsaw Pact (PHP). He has been a professor at Columbia University, the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, Boston University, and US Naval War College. His book, The Cold War and Soviet Insecurity, won the American Historical Association's George L. Beer Prize.

Foreword -- Introduction -- Gorbachev Turns to Political Reform -- Gorbachev's Changing Priorities -- Conflict of Interests and Ideas: The January Plenum -- Curbs on Arbitrary Behavior -- Burlatskii on Democratization -- Experiment with Contested Elections -- Glasnost Gains Momentum -- The Tools of Restructuring -- Return of Forbidden Literature -- Rediscovering Soviet History -- Criticism of the Afghanistan War -- Telebridges with the West -- Social Ills Exposed -- Prostitution in the USSR -- Drug Abuse -- Faltering Health Services -- The Misery of Rural Life -- The Lackluster Economy -- Little Glasnost on Economic Accomplishment -- Social Justice and Economic Progress -- Expansion of the Cooperative Sector -- Approaching the Ecological Barrier* -- Low Targets and Low Growth -- New Thinking on Security -- Sources of Security Reconsidered -- The Reykjavik Watershed -- Wisdom of Soviet Missiles Questioned -- Red Square Landing Shakes up Top Military -- Toward an Inf Treaty and Beyond -- Moscow's Foreign Policy and Public Relations -- The Vladivostok Speech -- Into Southeast Asia and the Pacific -- Iran and the Gulf War -- The Chautauqua Conference in Latvia -- Human Rights and Foreign Policy -- Ferment among Soviet Nationalities -- The Kazakhstan Riots -- Language Demands in Belorussia and the Ukraine -- Nationality Discord in Estonia -- Pamiat Takes to the Streets -- Czechoslovakia: The Touchstone of Gorbachevism -- The Springs of Prague and Moscow -- The Ultracautious Reformers -- The Trial of the Jazz Fans -- Gorbachev's Delayed Visit -- East Germany, Hungary, and Reform -- GDR: Complacency of the Unreformed -- Hungary: Despondency of the Reformed -- East Germany's Restive Churches -- Hungarian Experiments Continue -- Progress in Poland? -- Amnesty at Last -- New Consultative Council -- Solidarity Attempts to Regroup -- Diplomatic Isolation Broken -- Special Relationship with Miscow -- The Pope's Visit -- The Balkan Ways -- Reform Albanian Style -- Ceausescu and Gorbachev -- Greek-Bulgarian Friendship Treaty -- Genocide in Kosovo? -- Dissension Among Dissidents -- Yugoslavia's Divided Opposition -- Soviet Dissidents on Glasnost -- Czechoslovak Opposition Ponders Reform -- The Fad of Oriental Religions -- In Search of a New Europe -- The Europeans of the East -- A Comecon-Common Market Rapprochement -- East Berlin Cultivates European Identity -- Three Faces of Central Europe -- Whither the USSR? -- Popular Dissatisfaction with Gorbachev -- Liberalization and Soviet Jewry -- The Growth of "Informal Groups" -- The June Plenum: Too Far or Not Far Enough?