>Economic planning was (mostly) centralized in Moscow, but there were of
>course feedback mechanisms on the municipal, local and republican level.
It's been a long time since I read Hewett and Nove and the like, but as I remember, the planning mechanism wasn't anything like the rigid top-down caricature it was rendered as in the West. There was "market" feedback - not in price form, but more in volume form (e.g., no one bought the hideous shoes). And there was more interplay between center and periphery than the caricature says. In a better world, they'd have experimented with opening up the process, democratizing it, adding in lots of computers too, instead of junking it, which was a disaster.
Doug ---------
Amen to that. At least Gorbachev tried.
This feedback system also worked in quasi-democratic ways. During the 70s, the main domestic function of KGB informants was to gauge public opinion -- if a given reform was found to be too unpopular, it would get nixed. Interestingly, you can see this in Putin's approach to democracy. The demos doesn't help formulate policy, but any dimishing of his popularity rating is seen as an instant sign to back off. In a way, he's just being a good, patriotic KGB man.
Chris Doss The Russia Journal