Editing Comecon (section)

===Perestroika===
The 1985 Comprehensive Program for Scientific and Technical Progress and the rise to power of Soviet general secretary [[Mikhail Gorbachev]] increased Soviet influence in Comecon operations and led to attempts to give Comecon some degree of supranational authority. The Comprehensive Program for Scientific and Technical Progress was designed to improve economic cooperation through the development of a more efficient and interconnected scientific and technical base.<ref name="loc-cs" /> This was the era of ''[[perestroika]]'' ("restructuring"), the last attempt to put the Comecon economies on a sound economic footing.<ref>Bideleux and Jeffries, 1998, p. 579.</ref> Gorbachev and his economic mentor [[Abel Aganbegyan]] hoped to make "revolutionary changes" in the economy, foreseeing that "science will increasingly become a 'direct productive force', as Marx foresaw… By the year 2000… the renewal of plant and machinery… will be running at 6 percent or more per year."<ref>Abel Aganbegyan, quoted in Bideleux and Jeffries, 1998, p. 580.</ref>

The program was not a success. "The Gorbachev regime made too many commitments on too many fronts, thereby overstretching and overheating the Soviet economy. Bottlenecks and shortages were not relieved but exacerbated, while the ([[Central Europe|Central]] and) [[East Europe]]an members of Comecon resented being asked to contribute scarce capital to projects that were chiefly of interest to the Soviet Union…"<ref>Bideleux and Jeffries, 1998, p. 580.</ref> Furthermore, the liberalization that by June 25, 1988, allowed Comecon countries to negotiate trade treaties directly with the European Community (the renamed EEC), and the "[[Sinatra doctrine]]" under which the Soviet Union allowed that change would be the exclusive affair of each individual country marked the beginning of the end for Comecon. Although the [[Revolutions of 1989]] did not formally end Comecon, and the Soviet government itself lasted until 1991, the March 1990 meeting in Prague was little more than a formality, discussing the coordination of non-existent five-year plans. From January 1, 1991, the countries shifted their dealings with one another to a hard currency market basis. The result was a radical decrease in trade with one another, as "(Central and) Eastern Europe… exchanged asymmetrical trade dependence on the Soviet Union for an equally asymmetrical commercial dependence on the European Community."<ref>Bideleux and Jeffries, 1998, pp. 580–82; the quotation is on p. 582.</ref>

The final Comecon council session took place on June 28, 1991, in [[Budapest]], and led to an agreement to dissolve in 90 days.<ref>Bideleux and Jeffries, 1998, p. 582.</ref> The Soviet Union was dissolved on December 26, 1991.