Conversations with Gorbachev: on Perestroika, the Prague spring, and the crossroads of socialism

Introduction; Translator's Note; Author's Preface; CONVERSATION ONE: The Criss-Crossing of our Paths; 1. Student Communists; 2. New Hopes and New Disappointments; 3. Twenty Years, Divergent Paths; CONVERSATION TWO: How We Sought to Reinvigorate Socialism; 1 .The Prague Spring and its Defeat; 2. More Democracy, More Socialism; 3. Freedom of Choice Either Exists or It Doesn't; 4. An Airplane Took Off, Not Knowing Where It Would Land; 5. What to Do With the Party?; 6. Can the Use of Force ""Save Socialism""?; CONVERSATION THREE: There's Only One World.;Mikhail Gorbachev and Zdenek Mlynar were friends for half a century, since they first crossed paths as students in 1950. Although one was a Russian and the other a Czech, they were both ardent supporters of communism and socialism. One took part in laying the groundwork for and carrying out the Prague spring; the other opened a new political era in Soviet world politics. In 1993 they decided that their conversations might be of interest to others [...]and so they began to tape-record them. This book is the product of that?thinking out loud" process. It is an absorbing record of two fri.