What were the problems faced by the Eastern bloc nations in the 1970s and 1980s?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Answers will vary. The most significant problem was that managed economies were no longer a viable option. Many within the Communist Party criticized the movement to embrace consumerism that allowed the eastern nations to participate in the improved standards of living by material acquisition. The economic crises that ended the economic miracle of the western European states was felt much less significantly in the East, but at the start of the 1980s, there was tremendous underproduction and severe inflation, particularly in the Soviet Union. Popular protests in Czechoslovakia and Poland were brutally suppressed in support of the Brezhnev Doctrine. However, after the Helsinki Act, the United States and western European countries extended special loans and lower tariff rates to eastern European countries that agreed to protect human rights and allow the freedom of religion, and as it became hard to pay back those loans, Eastern bloc countries had to raise prices on formerly subsidized basic staples like food. Protests erupted because wages had not kept pace with the rate of inflation. Suppression of dissidents like Sakharov resonated in public images. The issuance of Charter 77 by Czech dissidents called on the government to adhere to the Helsinki Final Act. Strikes became more widespread, particularly in Poland. Worker dissatisfaction with living conditions, a shattered economy, and the backfiring of the consumer campaign were all indicative that communism was weakening in the East.