Editor's Introduction

Abstract

It is hardly surprising that the continuing collapse of the Soviet economy has been accompanied by the collapse of long-standing Soviet conceptions of both capitalism and socialism. The first two articles in our current issue provide some clear illustrations. Thus L. Abalkin, director of the Institute of Economics, explicitly recognizes the need for a "new economic paradigm" that would involve the abandonment of formerly sacred views and permit Soviet economic theory to assimilate some of the "radical transformations" that have characterized Western economies in recent decades ("The Tasks of Economic Science"). One problem that deserves special attention is the nature of a "mixed economy." Abalkin's formulation suggests that such an economy may be not simply a transitional stage of economic development but "a qualitatively new phenomenon generated by the progress of civilization." In other words, it is at least as likely that the future belongs to a "mixed economy" as to socialism.