But After Gorbachev, What?

The Soviet Union is moving rapidly toward a historic transfer of power from the Communist Party to a strong executive--too rapidly in the view of some understandably worried reformers.

A draft bill for a presidency invested with sweeping administrative powers has won overwhelming legislative approval in the Supreme Soviet, but not before many of that body’s more progressive members expressed anguished concern over the extent of the authority about to be granted to one person. These apprehensions would be understandable in any country struggling to nurture democratic development. They are particularly acute in a land where autocracy unfettered by humane self-restraint has been the traditional method of governance.

The obvious paradox is that even as the Communist Party is being stripped of its once all-powerful role in Soviet life, the legislature is preparing to approve near-dictatorial powers for the country’s chief executive. It helps, of course, that Mikhail S. Gorbachev is certain to be that president, initially chosen by the legislature for four years and then likely to run nationwide for a five-year term. Most reformers seem prepared to trust Gorbachev not to abuse his new powers. What’s troubling many of them is what happens after Gorbachev.

Many of the powers proposed for the presidency have their counterparts in one or another of the democracies, including the power to declare a state of emergency and impose martial law; to dissolve the legislature and call new elections; to control the military and the secret police. Most notable, at a time when the Soviet Union confronts growing ethnic unrest and separatist groups, is the power to act if civic order breaks down. Armed intervention to secure public safety, as in Azerbaijan recently, isn’t always a popular step, either with those sent to intervene or those who are intervened upon. But in the face of threatened anarchy, and especially in a country that has to worry about the security of all the nuclear weapons depots and nuclear power plants dotted across its vast landscape, it could be an unavoidable step.

What’s most clearly missing in the emerging governmental order is an effective system of checks and balances aimed at ensuring that executive authority will be used responsibly. Perhaps it’s too much--at this embryonic stage of Soviet political development--to expect that provisions would be made for legislative and judicial checks on presidential power. But if such restraints aren’t provided now, when, if ever, will they be? The reformers who have been raising that vexing question have good reasons to worry.