12 March 1990
(next to be held NA);
results--CPSU is the only party;
seats--(2,250 total) CPSU 1,931, non-CPSU 319;

USSR Supreme Soviet--last held NA June 1989
(next to be held NA);
results--CPSU is the only party;
seats--(542 total) CPSU 475, non-CPSU 67;

Council of the Union--last held Spring 1989
(next to be held NA);
results--CPSU is the only party;
seats--(271 total) CPSU 239, non-CPSU 32;

Council of Nationalities--last held Spring 1989
(next to be held NA);
results--CPSU is the only party;
seats--(271 total) CPSU 236, non-CPSU 35

Communists: about 19 million party members

Other political or pressure groups: Komsomol, trade unions, and
other organizations that facilitate Communist control; regional popular
fronts, informal organizations, and nascent parties with varying
attitudes toward the Communist Party establishment

Member of: CEMA, ESCAP, IAEA, IBEC, ICAC, ICAO, ICCO, ICES, ILO,
ILZSG, IMO, INRO, INTERPOL, IPU, ISO, ITC, ITU, International Whaling
Commission, IWC--International Wheat Council, UN, UNCTAD, UNESCO,
UPU, Warsaw Pact, WFTU, WHO, WIPO, WMO, WTO

Diplomatic representation: Ambassador-designate Aleksandr
BESSMERTNYKH; Chancery at 1125 16th Street NW, Washington DC 20036;
telephone (202) 628-7551 or 8548; there is a Soviet Consulate General
in San Francisco;
US--Ambassador Jack F. MATLOCK, Jr.; Embassy at Ulitsa Chaykovskogo
19/21/23, Moscow (mailing address is APO New York 09862);
telephone p7o (096) 252-24-51 through 59; there is a US Consulate General
in Leningrad

Flag: red with the yellow silhouette of a crossed hammer and sickle below
a yellow-edged five-pointed red star in the upper hoist-side corner

- Economy
Overview: The first five years of perestroyka (economic
restructuring) have undermined the institutions and processes of the
Soviet command economy without replacing them with efficiently
functioning markets. The initial reforms featured greater authority for
enterprise managers over prices, wages, product mix, investment, sources
of supply, and customers. But in the absence of effective market
discipline, the result was the disappearance of low-price goods,
excessive wage increases, an even larger volume of unfinished
construction projects, and, in general, continued economic stagnation.
The Gorbachev regime has made at least four serious errors in economic
policy in these five years: the unpopular and short-lived anti-alcohol
campaign; the initial cutback in im