Significance
Ligachev became one of Gorbachev’s primary critics, accused of leading a conservative faction. Although publicly endorsing perestroika, Ligachev was opposed to Gorbachev’s attempts to expand Soviet authority and limit the responsibilities of party officials. Ligachev did not support the decision to end the CPSU’s monopoly of political power in 1990, nor did he support Gorbachev’s response to the gradual withdrawal of Soviet authority in Eastern Europe, saying, for example, that "We should not overlook the impending danger of the accelerated reunification of Germany".
However, in 1988, Ligachev denied that he was leading a conservative faction, saying that the Party leadership were united behind Gorbachev. He also rejected suggestions after the fall of the Soviet Union that he had been opposed to Gorbachev in his memoirs and in speeches. Ligachev clearly demonstrated conservative ideas in his opposition of Yeltsin's political ideas, on the other hand, opposing the principles of glasnost. He later repudiated his opposition to Gorbachev's policies, saying it was "only too late discerned a social democrat in Gorbachev".
Ligachev denied time and again that he was opposed to Gorbachev in sources including his memoirs.
Ligachev's economically hard-line views were upheld in speeches he made to the CPSU's Congress in 1990. The following deplored privatization of the economy:
| “ | Public ownership unites, but private ownership disunites people's interests and indisputably causes social stratification of society.... For what purpose was perestroika started? For the purpose of most fully using the potential of socialism. Then does the sale of enterprises into private hands really promote the revealing of the possibilities inherent in the socialist system? No, it does not.... Lately people have begun saying, "Perestroika will develop, with the party or without it". I think otherwise. With the party, and only with the vanguard party, can we move forward on the way of socialist renewal. Without the party of Communists, perestroika is a lost cause.... | ” |
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—Yegor Ligachev |
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However, in this speech he also rejected the idea he was a conservative, saying he was a realist. Ligachev also stated earlier that "the slackening of state discipline" was "among the reasons for the troubled state of the economy". Furthermore, together with KGB head Viktor Chebrikov, Ligachev took several opportunities before he was demoted to Secretary for Agriculture in 1988 to warn against rapid reform.
Although not mentioned in his memoirs to any notable extent, Ligachev played a notable role in dismissing Yeltsin, arguing with him for long periods of time in 1987. Ligachev opposed Yeltsin's idea that Party officials enjoyed greater privilege. He became well known after the phrase "Boris, you are not right!", that was quoted widely in 1990s.
Ligachev was considered "Second Secretary" of the Central Committee (and thus the Soviet Union) for most of his time in the Politburo.
Ligachev appears in the videogame Crisis in the Kremlin.
Read more about this topic: Yegor Ligachev
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